


Our Crazy Ass Rollercoaster

by ArtemisRayne



Category: Scrubs
Genre: Amnesia, Car Accidents, F/M, Father-Son Relationship, Gen, Medical Trauma, Minor Character Death, Original Character Death(s), POV Alternating
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-08-29
Updated: 2009-08-29
Packaged: 2017-12-05 03:02:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 24
Words: 84,245
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/718131
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArtemisRayne/pseuds/ArtemisRayne
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Perry was only trying to help but in his bad mood, JD wasn't very grateful. When a disastrous accident strikes, Perry is forced into an awkward position. Can he get over himself enough to help? Without ruining his image? Does it really matter in the end?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. My Bad Day

**Author's Note:**

> This is set around the early parts of season 8, but is a little time-frame screwy because Dr. Cox is the Chief of Medicine, but JD and Elliot are not back together yet. Creative License, but I wrote this when I was 18 so cut me some slack...
> 
> The story switches occasionally between JD POV chapters and Perry POV chapters, although its mostly all Perry. So I've used the chapter titles to distinguish the difference. If it starts with "My..." then it's JD, and if it's "His..." then it's Perry, kinda like they do on the show. That's important to avoid confusion. 
> 
> The italicized part at the beginning is like a voice-over, again like the show, that summarizes the theme of the chapter.

_Life at Sacred Heart has a certain rhythm that doesn't take all that long to learn. After you've been around this place for a while, you can usually predict exactly how your day will go from the moment you step inside. It's like the building has its own energy that warps you when you walk through the doors. No matter how good your day is outside, if the energy is bad then you feel it the very second you step in. And I knew as those automated doors slid open that today was going to be one of those days from hell._

I jogged into the Sacred Heart lobby, my backpack over my head to protect myself from the pouring rain. I groaned when I was finally safe inside, realising that my carefully styled hair had been deflated by the weather. I was already going to be late when I left but I'd spent that extra time to gel my luscious locks and was even later for nothing. Shaking my head, I slipped my backpack on and prepared myself for what I could already tell would be a  _super_  day.

A sharp whistle cut through the air before I'd taken a step.  _Great._  Dr Cox was leaning against the admissions counter, staring down at a clipboard disinterestedly but his expectant stance made it clear that he was waiting for me to come over. It was bad enough I was already late but the fact that Dr Cox just happened to be standing around when I got there was not helping my case any. It was almost like he'd been waiting in the lobby all morning for this very reason. Which I reminded myself was so very possible. "You're late, Mandy."

Today was not my best day to deal with this first thing. I'd gotten almost no sleep all weekend except in fifteen-minute naps because Sam had an ear infection and had hardly stopped crying the whole time. When I'd woken up this morning, I was already late and had to rush to get my son's things packed up so he could go to Kim's for the week, forgetting half of it with the hurried promise that I would bring it to her later. The terrible weather had only lengthened my commute, as well as getting me nearly wrecked by a hydroplaning minivan, and on top of it had ruined all the hard work I'd put into my hair. More burnt out than I could remember ever being, and with a thirty-hour shift ahead of me, I was simply not in the mood.

"Just leave me alone," I spat bitterly.

This finally made Dr Cox look up from the chart he'd been pretending to read. "Whoa there, you sure those little lace panties will still fit if you grow a pair, Belinda?" he said in his usual bitingly sarcastic tone. Without waiting for the reply he knew I wouldn't bother giving, Dr Cox continued. "Now listen here, Polly, because I re- _heally_  do not want to repeat myself and have to prolong this conversation with you. Ever notice those pretty little schedules we make up? Well, we have those for a reason, and it is  _nawt_  so you can ignore them and come in whenever you damn well please. Now I know just how important your beauty sleep is, but–"

Before I knew what I was doing, I found myself saying a phrase I'd heard a million times but never dreamt that I would actually use myself.

"Blow it out your ass, Perry."

With this, I left the stunned-silent Chief of Medicine and made my way to my locker to get dressed, too irritated to even feel any pleasure in my victory. Although I might have been just a little bit nervous. Or possibly mortified, it was hard to tell. My brain was sort of blank with what I think may very well have been panic.

The rest of my day never got any better. One of my patients coded before I'd even finished jumping into my scrubs and we never managed to resuscitate him. Later, I nearly broke my neck when Janitor tripped me (yeah, I know, real shocker), and I ended up against the wall buried beneath a gurney and a full shelf of medical equipment. Not just the equipment but the actual shelf, too. When I went into the on-call room the coffee machine was empty but after setting it up I got paged away before I could get any of that much needed caffeine. Turns out it was a moronic intern who had given a patient the wrong dosage of sedative and caused him going into respiratory arrest. Not in a forgiving mood, I promptly ended his internship in a berating way that I knew sounded much like the mentor I'd been determinedly avoiding all day.

On top of it all, by the time I managed to make it to the cafeteria all of the pie  _and_ pudding cups were gone. Groaning loudly, I dropped down into the chair opposite where Carla was sitting by herself, it being Turk's day off.

"What's the matter, Bambi?" Carla asked, her voice instantly going maternal as she surveyed me concernedly.

"Bad day," I answered, picking unexcitedly at the soggy vegetables on my tray before abandoning the idea and taking a bite out of the dry sandwich. You'd think people as important as life-saving doctors deserved slightly better grub.

"You look exhausted."

"Sam has an ear infection and was crying all weekend," I explained.

Carla made a soft humming noise as she nodded. "Yeah, Izzy had one a few months ago. Do you need me to find someone to cover for you so you can go sleep?"

I shook my head firmly. "Nah, I'll be fine," I assured her. Without much effort, because it never took a lot of effort when Carla was involved, I brought back my smile. It was more genuine than any other smile I'd put on all day. Carla's attention always made me feel warm and fuzzy, like the way I imagined Rowdy felt when I let him sit in my lap while we watched a movie. Oh god, now I'm comparing myself to a dog. That'll make Dr Cox's insulting easier. Oh, speaking of him… "I yelled at Dr Cox."

Carla's eyes widened. "Wow, what happened?" she asked, her voice torn between worry and amusement. When I finished, there was something almost like pride in her eyes. "Good for you, Bambi. What did he think about it?"

"I don't know, I haven't seen him since," I admitted and fidgeted nervously, glancing around the cafeteria to make sure he wasn't hovering in some corner waiting to pounce. "I have sort of been keeping as far away as possible. But he hasn't hunted me down so I think I'll be okay." I buried myself in my lunch, aware that I didn't have much more time before I had to get back to work. So obviously it startled me when Carla suddenly reached over and brushed her thumb over a forming bruise above my right eye. "Ow!" I hissed accusingly, drawing away from the pain and batting her hand away, pushing my lower lip out in a pout.

"Sorry. What happened there?" she asked and even while sitting, her hand planted itself on her hip, pushing her lips out in that Carla-from-the-block pose that meant there was no way you could  _not_  answer her and still live.

"Janitor," I confessed with a shrug. "He tripped me with his mop and I fell onto his cleaning cart, which rolled down the hall and into this empty gurney, which I got flipped over and fell against a shelf of medical equipment, and the whole mess came down on me." JD frowned and gently prodded the bruise. "Thankfully it was mostly towels and bed sheets and such, the bruises all came from the cart and the gurney. This one's from the shelf falling down on me."

"You know it's remarkable what that man can come up with," Carla said, shaking her head in wonder. "Maybe he really did go to Harvard, he seems he might really have been that smart. Even if he does talk to stuffed squirrels. I know he's mean to you, Bambi, but I always wonder what he'll dream up next."

My head tilted to the left and, for a moment, I let my eyes go unfocused.

_Janitor was sitting behind a table that was covered in phials filled with glowing chemicals. He was wearing a high-collared white lab coat and huge black gloves that covered half of his arms. "I will get my ultimate vengeance," the Janitor said in a deep, echoey voice. He picked up a phial that was florescent orange and stared at it almost greedily. "With this potion, I will turn him into the most despised creature on the planet." He poured the potion into a pan and put it in the oven. A second later there was a ding and he pulled a pie out of the oven._

" _Here, kitty," he said and he fed a piece of the pie to a kitten sitting on the table. When it swallowed, there was a puff of smoke and suddenly the cat was gone. Ted was sitting in its place, looking around, and he let out a confused, "Meow?"_

" _Ha ha, it works," Janitor said, laughing menacingly. "Now I must find Scooter and make him eat it as well. Then he will become the sweaty, creepy lawyer-man that no one really likes. It will ruin his life." And the Janitor broke down in wild, mad-scientist laughter…_

"Must never eat the pie," I said, shaking my head as I came out of the fantasy. Man, even my daydreams aren't up to snuff today. I still found myself grateful that I hadn't gotten a slice of pie because now I was certain I wouldn't have been able to make myself eat it, no matter how delicious it looked.

"What was that?" Carla asked, having clearly turned her interest to her lunch when she figured out I wasn't really paying attention to her anymore.

"Oh, nothing," I said. "Man, I hope I get to sleep a little tonight."

Quite suddenly, The Todd was in the seat next to me, appearing, as usual, out of nowhere. With that ridiculously wide smile on his face, he held up a hand and said, "Yeah, Banging-All-Night-Five!"

I stared at him for a second before deciding I was not in the mood. "Go away, Todd."

The Todd's smile flickered. "Ouch, Rejection-Five!" Knowing the surgeon would never go away unless I did, I held up my hand and let The Todd hit it with an unnecessary amount of force. His grin back in place, The Todd disappeared again. Rolling his eyes, I returned to his lunch, massaging my stinging hand beneath the table where I hoped Carla wouldn't see.

"You sure you're going to be okay, Bambi?" Carla asked, setting down her fork and fixing me in her wide, brown-eyed stare. Oh no, not that soft Mama Bear look! She knows I can't lie to her when she looks at me like that. "You really don't look so well. Do you–"

"I'm fine, Carla," I said, a little harsher than I'd meant to.  _Oops._ But I was an adult and an accomplished doctor after all! I could take care of myself. Still, she meant well and I instantly felt bad. "Sorry."

"Okay," she said, silently accepting my apology with a nod and a smile. "You come find me if you need me, okay?"

"Yeah, thanks," I said, a lot calmer. Carla always had that affect on me. She was certainly more adept as soothing and comforting me than either of my parents had been, or any of the various step-fathers I'd had. Carla smiled at me sweetly, patting my cheek, and then walked away, but not before setting her pudding cup on my tray. I smiled, looking over my shoulder to watch her head for the elevators. Well, at least one good thing had happened today. Pudding!

A few minutes later, I had wolfed down the rest of my lunch, even the limp vegetables, not realising just how hungry I'd been. With all the chaos this morning, I think I might have forgotten to eat breakfast and a stale coffee was just not all that filling. The pudding cup was devoured last and a little slower than the rest to savour it, until of course I realised that I was due back to the ICU three minutes ago. Swallowing the rest of the pudding in one enormous spoonful, I got rid of my tray and jogged back up to the nurses' station to look over my charts.

Now sufficiently relaxed, fed, and caffeinated, I found myself in a little better of a mood as I began flipping through my clipboards. I visited a few of my patients and it seemed like maybe the day wouldn't be a total wreck. The optimism made me feel a little more like myself again. A bit of hope in my chest, I went back to the nurses' station and Carla handed out a manila folder to me. "Lily Marks' lab results," she said and then had to turn her attention to the ringing phone on the counter.

I took the folder and headed for the familiar room. Lily was a twelve-year-old girl who had come in two days ago after having a seizure. She seemed to be doing better at the hospital but she still had a strange nervous tic in her one arm that she said hadn't been as much of a problem before the seizure. I had honestly become a little attached to her. I think it was hard not to love her because she was always grinning and joking with him and it turned out we had very similar personalities. I was looking forward to being able to fix her and send her home. It was always the most gratifying experience to be able to send a healthy child home; in a way it was the best part of the job. I loved helping people but helping little kids was even better, especially now that I'm a father, too.

Glancing down through the lab results, I scanned to see if any of the tests had come up positive. I was only a few feet away from the room when my eyes found that affirmative next to a name that sent a thrill of horror through me.  _Oh God no_. For a few minutes I couldn't move, just stood staring at the window to her room. Lily was sitting up in bed, talking to her parents animatedly and ignoring the way her left arm kept fidgeting on her lap. Now that I saw it, I knew that the diagnosis made sense. Too much sense to explain away. I instantly found myself wishing that Dr Cox's first guess diagnosis had been right. I would owe the older doctor twenty dollars but at least it wouldn't be  _this_. How to tell them, though? No, I couldn't do this. I'd given this sort of diagnosis to older people before but never to someone even  _close_  to her age.

Lily glanced out the window and spotted me, smiling brightly and waving. She looked so young, so fresh, so bright. Even in this place that was so filled with illness and death, she was always smiling and happy. Life wasn't fair. Well, there was no backing out now, not with her parents also looking out of the window at me expectantly. Steadying myself, I walked into the room with as much of a smile as I could fake. "Hey there, Lily," I said, probably a little overly-bright. She didn't notice but it looked like her parents might have.

"Hi, JD," she replied, smiling up at me.

Feeling something in my chest starting to ache and knowing the lump in the throat would follow quickly if I didn't get outta the room, I glanced over at her parents. I was usually pretty good at being a professional and keeping my composure, especially after so many years of practice, but this had to be one of the hardest and most heartbreaking diagnoses I'd ever given. Scratch that, it was  _the_  hardest. "Mr and Mrs Marks, could I have a word with you in the hall?"

The Marks' exchanged nervous glances but nodded and, after telling their daughter they'd be right back, they stepped out into the hall and I closed the door behind them. "What is it?" Mr Marks asked, boldly even though he was visibly trembling. "You know what's wrong with Lily?"

I drew on every ounce of strength I had before letting the words come out. "Your daughter has Huntington's disease," I finally said and felt as though I brought the medical axe down over the little girl's neck myself by doing so. The parents looked concerned but confused so I was resigned to explaining. "It's a rapidly progressive, degenerative brain disease. It causes the nerve cells in the brain to die, which is what's causing her involuntary muscle movements as well as her seizures. Normally, the disease does not manifest until adulthood but it does occasionally appear in children. And, unfortunately, because her body is still growing it is not ready to handle the symptoms, which is why they came so fast and so strongly."

"Can you fix it?" Mr Marks pressed on. His wife seemed to be far beyond words as she clung to her husband's side and stared through the window at the young girl blankly.

"There are medications that can ease the symptoms a little but I am afraid there is no cure," I said as calmly as I could. There was a painful moment as the man's face seemed to collapse in on itself and he struggled to keep his composure. I had to look down before I joined him in his mini-breakdown.

"How long?" the other man finally choked out. "Until she–"

"Judging by the speed of the progression, I couldn't say more than two months, but even that is a stretch," I said, forcing myself to look back up. They deserved that much from their doctor. "As the brain cells continue to die off she will lose the ability to control her basic movements such as walking and speaking. Her systems will continue to shut down until–" I stopped, a large knot in my throat stopping me from saying those few final words. I cleared my throat and gave them a few seconds before continuing. "You should also know that Huntington's is a genetic disease. Although it seems likely in this case that the disease was formed by a unique genetic mutation in the sperm when she was conceived, it is also possible that she might have inherited it from one of you. We can have you tested here if you choose."

"Thank you, Dr Dorian," Mr Marks said. Inwardly, I flinched. I hated it when people thanked me for giving them bad news. It always seemed like when I told people that they or someone they knew were going to die, they thanked me. I would have felt more comfortable if they had yelled and hit me; although, with the already throbbing bruise above my eye, as well as some hidden ones on my ribs and legs, I would have been content with just yelling today. However, the parents just held each other and looked in at their child, who was reading a magazine, completely oblivious to the fact that she was dying. "We'd like a moment to be with our daughter," the father said in an emotionless voice that I recognised. That empty nothing before the truth of it really sank in.

"Of course. I will be by again later." I watched as they desperately fought to clear their expressions, which wasn't too difficult because they both had a very vacant look in their eyes, and then went back in to sit on either side of Lily's bed.

Feeling as though I had been kicked repeatedly in the chest and stomach, I went to toss my charts onto the nurses' station and then collapsed on a couch in the nearest doctor's lounge. For a long while, I sat there, struggling to regain control of myself. It was a relief that there was no one in the lounge with me and the one person who entered only filled up a coffee cup and left without a word. I wasn't crying but when I thought about those crushed parents or that bright, cheery girl who was going to die I came very close. Just when I had thought that my bad day might be turning up it had taken a very fast, kamikaze-style nose-dive into the ground.

It was fifteen minutes later, and a good several extra seconds of scrubbing my hands roughly over my face, when I felt composed enough to return to work. I needed something to distract myself or emotions would get me and I couldn't do that. As often as I got teased about it, the J-Dizzle does  _not_  cry. Stopping at the nurses' station, grateful Carla was elsewhere because she would have seen through my false smile and made me tell her what happened, I grabbed the charts of only those patients who I knew would recover and devoted the next part of my shift to checking on them before dealing with the bad news again. Sometimes I needed that little bit of hope and promise to save me from the death that seemed to hang around us all here.

The end of my regular shift finally came and I readied myself for the ultimate nightmare that was an on-call night. Completely exhausted, I trudged into the on-call room, after wishing Carla good night, in hopes of catching a few minutes sleep before I would undoubtedly be summoned for one thing or another. However, when I opened the door I felt my heart stop in my chest for a second. Dr Cox was stretched out on a bunk, his arms under his head as he stared up at the ceiling with as much focus as if it were one of those sporty games he was always talking about. It was the first time I had come face-to-face with my mentor since my arrival and I prepared myself for the condescending lecture.

"Hey, you wanna shut the door there, Gladys? I'm trying to sleep."

Surprised but grateful, I closed the door and then climbed into an empty bunk. I didn't even have time to think about the possibility of Dr Cox quietly murdering me in my sleep because almost the instant my cheek touched the pillows my eyes were shut and I was asleep.


	2. His Being Wrong-ness

_Life at Sacred Heart is usually pretty predictable, honestly. Things don't often change around here and it takes a lot to throw someone as experienced as me for a loop. Kelso lurks down in the CoffeeBucks and is as much of an ass as when he ruled this hellhole, Carla bosses people around and keeps me sane-ish, Barbie is, well, a Barbie doll, the surgeons are overly-cocky jocks, the interns are idiots, and Newbie follows me around and tries to be my best friend. Of course, every once in a while there is that bizarre day where nothing seems to make sense at all. And that day was today._

I tried to convince myself that not having Newbie hovering over me all day had been a relief. It was a blessing to not have to deal with the girl pestering me, trying to tell me personal stories that  _no_ -body could possibly care about, and calling me 'mentor' while trying to sneak in a hug. And any other day it would have been like a welcome reprieve. But damn it all, not today.

It was a rare occasion when Newbie lost his temper with anyone, especially with me. Angry just wasn't something that the kid did. It had happened before, but even then it had seemed strange and it hadn't lasted all that long. The kid would let off a rant that  _almost_  made me proud of him, although I would ne- _hever_  admit it, and then he would just go back to being the normally, puppy-esque Newbie. So when the kid blew up at me, (using one of my own trademark insults against me, I might add), I had expected that in an hour or two he would be back, toting a coffee like some sort of apology and pretending nothing happened.

Boy, did I hate being wrong.

For the rest of the day, I hardly ever saw Newbie, except occasionally when he was rounding a corner far ahead of me. When we ended up moving toward each other in a hall the kid would turn into a room or another hall before he was within whistling range. It was almost like the kid was avoiding me. Probably expected his mentor –  _don't you think that word too, Perry_  - to give him a good berating for that little display of backbone, if I knew Newbie. Which of course I did. Honestly, though, I never felt closer to the kid than when he had those moments. They were sort of like watching a younger, extremely more feminine and infinitely less awesome and impressive version of me. Imitation was the first form of flattery, or something like that.

Still, when the kid didn't snap back to his normal self I started to worry. No, not worry, I didn't  _worry_  about the girl. Perry Cox doesn't worry. It just had me – confused? No, not that either. Anyway, whatever it was, it was driving me crazy. I didn't like things to change around the place, and not having Newbie coming to me all day was a change. As annoying as it was, it was a sort of normalcy that I craved. Sure, Beelzebob was still sitting downstairs, stuffing himself with muffins and making snide remarks, Carla was being a mother hen, Private Practice Barbie was thankfully already clocked out and gone home to be annoying to some flavour of the week boy toy, the Janitor was mopping the same spot he'd been in for three hours ( _why do I pay that jackass so well again?_ ), and the interns had nearly killed someone (which I was surprised to learn had led to Newbie ending an internship with a long-winded rant; another swelling of almost-but-not-really-pride for me.) However, Newbie was being that stupid last missing piece of the puzzle and I was annoyed at him for ruining my perfect little safe-haven.

Oh well, I was on-call tonight - because despite being Chief of Medicine, I believed as a doctor I should still do, well, doctorly stuff - with Newbie and one of the interns who had survived his wrath, so I would get everything back to normal. Surely some code would come up, I would tell the kid to assist me, and after that, it would all be normal again. The kid could go back to irritating me and I could be frustrated with that instead of with dealing with the fact that I was mad at myself for actually –  _god, am I really gonna say it?_  – missing having the kid chasing me.

I was laying down in the on-call room when I heard Newbie come in just like I'd expected. For a moment, it seemed like the little girl would turn tail and run but I just chimed in with a half-true, "Hey, ya wanna shut the door there, Gladys? I'm trying to sleep." So I wasn't actually trying to sleep, mostly because I'd only recently finished downing several coffees and was still full of caffeine. However, I did want that damned door closed; it was sickeningly bright out in the hall and my eyes had only just adjusted to the darkness in the on-call room.

To my relief, the kid decided that he'd been given the all clear and shut the door quickly. Out of the corner of my eye, I watched the kid drop down onto the mattress opposite mine as if he hadn't lain down in months. Before I'd counted to ten I heard the kid's breathing slip into the slower cadence of sleep.

Grunting, I shifted myself into a more comfortable spot on the terribly uncomfortable mattress. Mental note: try to fit new mattresses into next quarter's budget somehow. No wonders the doctors were always exhausted. Speaking of exhausted, it had been obvious this morning that Newbie was tired. The rings under his eyes had been evidence enough but the explosive anger didn't help the case any either. The kid had been working himself like a lunatic lately, willingly covering shifts without asking for a trade and doing more than his fair share of on-call all-nighters and weekends, probably all to help support that kid of his.

I hadn't said anything yet, hoping the kid would get the hint on his own, but it was about time to step in. It wasn't healthy. He needed his sleep or he was going to make mistakes and kill patients. That was something I knew I couldn't let him do. With Ted as a lawyer, the hospital couldn't handle that sort of lawsuit. And the kid had a hard enough time dealing with the deaths, even after all these years, but doing so with as burnt out as he was now was asking for a mental breakdown.

The silence in the on-call room had only lasted fifteen minutes before it was broken by the all-too-familiar incessant beeping. I sat up calmly but the kid bolted up so fast his head collided with the underside of the mattress above him. We both checked our pagers, Newbie cursing none-too-impressively under his breath as he rubbed his forehead. It was that worst-case scenario: a patient who'd been recovering that morning had gone into cardiac arrest.

Both of us jumped up, me snatching my lab coat off the end of my bed, and charged through the door. As we ran, the younger doctor was fiercely rubbing the sleep out of his eyes. Just down the hall from the room, the skittish intern jumped out in front of me and I crashed into her, sending us both to the ground, her screeching in fear and me cussing. By the time I managed to extract myself from the tangle with the crushed girl and get my bearings enough to move, Newbie was already running the room.

The shrieking of the flatline on the heart monitor played as a backdrop for the chaos of Newbie shouting and nurses bustling around adjusting IVs and doing what the doctor was telling them. "He's bleeding internally," the kid said loudly enough to be heard. "Need to relieve the pressure." An instant later a nurse had stepped in to cover the side of the guy's chest with a topical anaesthetic and put a scalpel in Newbie's hand. It was as the young attending lowered the blade toward the orange-tinted skin that I noticed it: his hand suddenly faltered, shaking slightly, and he blinked hard in an attempt to focus his vision.  _Oh shit._

"Move it, Rebecca," I said, simultaneously pushing the kid away and snatching the scalpel out of his hand. I ignored the other doctor's startled complaint and continued with the procedure. Once the incision had been made, we forced a tube through and put the suction hose in. I watched as the crimson liquid was pulled out through the hose and, after a few seconds, the line on the monitor began registering heartbeats again. When the monitor finally settled into a steady rhythm, I inwardly sighed with relief. My day had been bad enough, I didn't want to start my night off by losing the first code.

Five minutes later, we had stabilised the man completely, stopping the internal bleeding and stitching the cut in his side. The man was conscious and responding while the nurses checked him for any further damage. Now that I was certain everything was under control without me, I turned to let loose on Newbie.

He was gone.

"Where'd Clara go?" I snapped at a passing nurse.

"Clara?" she asked in confusion. I crossed my arms, after quickly touching nose with my thumb, and glared unrelentingly until she seemed to understand. "Oh, I dunno. He took off after you took over and didn't come back."

Nodding curtly to show I'd heard her answer, I left in search of the younger doctor. The stupid intern could handle working the patients for a little while, she needed to learn how anyway. I was still annoyed with her for stepping into my way and making me second into the room. If I'd gotten there before Newbie then we wouldn't be in this mess now.

Finding Newbie turned out harder than I'd anticipated. I checked everywhere the kid commonly haunted; the on-call room, the lounge, the empty cafeteria, the lockers, and even the restrooms, looking around in the men's and pressing my ear to the girls' in case the kid had gone in there to cry. Starting to get anxious, I began thinking more abstractly. I peeked into a few of the kid's patients' rooms to see if he'd gone there. It wasn't unlike the kid to talk to a patient at night or even seek advice from the kinder old ones. Not seeing him there I checked in a few coma patients' rooms, not at all surprised by the idea Newbie might talk to one of them. Nothing. I jogged down and out onto the ramp outside the hospital, remembering having seen him come out here sometimes for air. That silly blue car was still here but no Newbie.

No one that I asked seemed to give me any useful answers. It was mostly, "I think he went that way about ten minutes ago." Yeah, because knowing where he was ten minutes ago did any good. I had just closed the door to that supply closet where Barbie used to hide when she was upset when I let out a growl under my breath, startling a lone orderly. Why did the stupid little girl have to complicate things so much? I set off down another hall when I spotted a sign outside a door I hadn't thought of yet. I threw it open and ran up the stairs.

When I pushed open the door to the roof I froze. The rain had mercifully stopped a few hours ago but the damp gravel and concrete glowed beneath the lights that lined the roof. Newbie was standing on the low ledge of the building, out of the light and hardly visible, with his arms wrapped around his torso and his back to me. A fleeting, horrified thought claimed me before I brushed it away.  _He wouldn't do that_ , I assured myself.  _The kid knows better, he's smarter than that._

"Newbie." He didn't respond but it was clear he'd heard because his back tensed and he stood up straighter. "What are you doing up there?"

"I love the way it smells after the rain," the kid answered in an oddly detached voice that made the hair on the back of my neck stand up. "Sometimes I can forget I'm standing over a building filled with death. Everything smells so clean and –  _alive_. I wish it always smelt so nice."

"Yeah, well, you can talk to your janitor friend and see if he'll put in some of those scented air fresheners like you have all over your girly little apartment," I responded, trying and failing to achieve my normal level of sarcasm. The kid was standing calmly enough but the concrete beneath his feet was wet and probably slippery, not to mention the kid had never been the most graceful ballerina. "Now you wanna tell me again why you're standing up there? What, does the air not smell as pretty down at a level where you wouldn't kill yourself if you fell? Well, you might still manage it–"

Newbie snorted derisively. "I'm not gonna jump, if that's what you're thinking."

The abrupt answer, dripping with cynicism, startled me as much as the fact that he had interrupted me. I'd heard the kid get bitter plenty of times before, it sort of came with the job, but he was rarely so blunt. "I didn't–"

Newbie let his arms fall down to his sides and the movement made me stop short, intuition flaring. "I've learned how to take all you throw at me by now. If I was gonna make some morale-crushed dive to death it would've been years ago. Don't flatter yourself, you've never tormented me that bad. I'm over all the name-calling and the insults and the ranting. But I just–"

As Newbie paused, I took a step forward and the door, which had been propped against my side, swung shut. The noise surprised the kid and, for a second, his arms went out away from his sides as he steadied himself.

"Would you get the hell down from there?" I said, my voice thankfully coming out more waspish than worried like I felt. "No more balance beam, Marsha, you're clumsy enough when you're standing on flat ground and not on the edge of a building."

The kid mumbled an irritable, "I'm fine," but turned around and jumped down onto the roof. When he straightened up, I was once again struck by how bad he looked. His skin was pale, paler than usual anyway, except for the thick rings under his eyes and the shadow of what looked like a healthy bruise on his forehead. Had he done that sitting up in the on-call room? His nose was pretty red, probably from standing out here in the cold for so long. That ridiculous hair, which was normally obsessed about to a point which made it impossible to question that sort of femininity, was oddly devoid of products and hung limply around his face. However, most alarming was that expression: goofy smile replaced by a firm line, and his eyes were so – lifeless. Definitely not my Newbie.

"Listen, Newbie–"

"I had it under control!" he suddenly shouted. "I had everything under control. Why'd you come in and throw me out? Believe it or not, I do know how to do my job by now. I mean, I did that same procedure my very first day here."

"Now listen here, Petula," I said loudly. I flicked my nose and folded my arms on my chest, spreading my legs slightly to strengthen my stance. Alpha male mode. "I stepped in so you wouldn't kill your patient. You're so tired you can't even see straight. And in case you're wondering, that is  _nawt_  a good thing when you're cutting into a guy's chest."

"We're always tired around here, part of the job, I'm used to it," Newbie threw in.

I whistled sharply and the kid fell silent. "Don't interrupt me, Lucy," I warned. "Now when was the last time you got a good night's sleep?" Newbie scowled and crossed his arms, solidifying his stance in a way that seemed a little too familiar to me, but he didn't answer the question. "Yeah, by that I'm guessing it's been just a bit too long. So here's what you're gonna do; you're gonna go get your stuff and skip on home. Tonight you're gonna sleep even if you gotta bang your head re- _he_ - _heely_  hard with a rock to do it, cause I'm sure all that girly hair will keep your skull safe. And then you can come back in for your shift tomorrow when you're all fully functioning. Got it, pum'kin?"

"I don't need to go home, Dr Cox," Newbie protested. "I'll get a bit of a nap in the on-call room and a cup of coffee. I can do it, I'm fine." He started for the door but I stepped in front of him, blocking the path with my proudly-muscled girth. "Could you move it? I'm sure I've got patients waiting for me."

"Well then they're just gonna have to wait a little longer, aren't they?" I said, my voice rising into the higher pitch I used when I was being patronising. "Alright, Rita, I'm gonna break it down real easy for ya. Here are your options: either you go home now and sleep like I said or I am gonna have your skinny ass suspended and you'll have all the time in the world to sleep until I decide you should come back. Now get the ha- _ell_  outta here. If I see you here again before your shift tomorrow you had better have cracked your skull on that aforementioned rock and are dying.  _Capisce_?" I stepped back and opened the door to the stairs, gesturing over-dramatically for the kid to go.

Newbie stood there for a moment, glaring determinedly at me. We might look way,  _way_  different, but the kid had certainly mastered his mentor's –  _gah, quit using that word, Perry!_  – angry pose. I half expected to see the kid flick at his nose with a thumb. We waited in that burning silence for a full minute before a muscle twitched in the kid's jaw.

"Go to hell."

The pure, cold hatred in that simple sentence was enough to make my perfect façade crack for a split second. Not only had I never anticipated getting that sort of answer, but I remembered a time when the phrase had been thrown in the opposite direction. Had it stung the kid this bad? Of course, it would've been worse. The kid idolised me. And in those simple three words, I saw something else that I quite suddenly decided I didn't like. He had become  _me_.

Without another word, the kid had stormed passed me and down the stairs. It was a long two minutes after the sound of footsteps had died before I moved. With a sigh, I let the door shut again and moved to the ledge where the kid had been standing. I scrubbed my hands over my face a few times, trying to wash away the memory of what had just happened, before resting my elbows on the concrete and staring out into the night. As much as I secretly enjoyed the way Newbie had hero-worshipped me from the moment he'd appeared at Sacred Heart, being like me was not a fate I wished on the kid.

For the first time in a long time, I found himself wondering if I could have made things different. On Newbie's very first day the kid had been doing that same procedure I had just snapped away from him. When the kid did it I had almost clapped him on the shoulders but stopped at the last second. What if I'd gone through with it? Given Newbie that little sign of approval that he seemed to need so badly? Maybe then Newbie would have understood that he was a good doctor the way he was and didn't need to be like his mentor.  _Damn, said it again._  Newbie had always taken the abuse I put on him surprisingly well for such a femmy guy, but it seemed like he'd built up too many expectations for himself. He still needed to understand that he couldn't do it all. It's not like he was some kind of Superman.

The sharp, metallic slamming of a car door made me look down. The lights on Newbie's sissy car flared into life along with the low rumble of the engine. A second later, it had reversed out of the stall and tore out of the parking lot, probably a lot faster than he really should. Still, at least he was going home to sleep like I'd said. Newbie would thank me for it tomorrow.


	3. His All-Time Low

_If there's one thing to understand about Sacred Heart, it's that no matter how much you think you know, there is always something that will throw you flat on your ass. Whether it's having a patient come in with some disease you just can't diagnose, or having to tell the parents that you couldn't save their child, or even just being jumped by Johnny the tackling Alzheimer's patient, it leaves you with the same painful, horrible feeling. But every once in a while you get to deal with a brand new kind of ass-whooping that leaves every one of those preconceived notions you had about 'all time low' in the dust._

I sighed heavily, pushing myself up from where I'd been leaning against the ledge. As much as I was enjoying the five-minute break I'd been taking in the fresh night air, I really needed to get back downstairs. Especially now that I'd sent Newbie home because I'd have to pick up that extra slack myself until the back-up on-call doctor showed up, provided he answered the page and actually came. That intern girl couldn't be expected to do much, she was an idiot. In fact, it was a miracle she hadn't already paged me for some dumb reason or another. So much for getting caught up on paperwork tonight.

Taking one last breath of unsterilized air, I jogged back into the building and began rifling through the patient charts at the nurses' station. God, this was gonna be a long night. I spotted one particular name on the edge of a folder and pulled it out curiously.  _Lily Marks_. I knew the kid was sort of attached to her, not an unusual thing for the kid really, but I honestly liked her, too. She was always so bright and smiling, even within a few seconds of coming to after yet another seizure. Probably why the kid liked her; they had that same eternal optimism. Her blood work had come back and I quietly opened the folder, wondering if I'd been right about Parkinson's. Newbie'd owe me money tomorrow if so, which might have been why the kid hadn't mentioned that the results came back at all.

The bold heading next to the word 'positive' made me stop short. Not Parkinson's. Huntington's.  _Oh God._ That wasn't fair. Parkinson's was treatable. Livable. We would be able to give her medications that would make it easier and she could live on and enjoy the rest of her life. But with Huntington's, especially this progressed, well it didn't seem like she'd have much more of a life to enjoy.

"You're cruel," I muttered, staring upward in the direction of that non-existent higher being I liked to blame things like this on. I needed a coffee. Tossing the folder back onto the counter, I made my way into the closest doctor's lounge. Thankfully there was still some coffee in the bottom of the pot, even if it was frigid. I poured it into a Styrofoam cup and set it in the microwave, tapping my foot impatiently as it revolved in the little radiation box. No wonders Newbie had been so fried today. On top of all that exhaustion, he'd found out that little girl was gonna die. That must have been why he was so fixed on things being alive when we'd been up on the roof. Why hadn't Newbie said anything? Normally, if something was bugging him he'd hunt me down and force me to listen to all his problems. Oh right, Newbie'd been avoiding me because of that whole momentarily growing a pair thing.

The beeping of the microwave caught my attention and I eagerly lifted the steaming cup of what I was sure would be less than satisfactory coffee. Just as I was about to take a sip, the pager at my hip went off and I jumped, splashing scalding liquid over my wrist. "Damn it," I hissed, setting the cup down on top of the microwave and drying my burning hand with a paper towel. Once I'd finished saving myself from second-degree burns, I grabbed the beeping monstrosity, expecting to see the intern needing me to answer some stupid question. Code, new patient crashed in the elevator. I cursed again and ran out of the lounge, stopping only long enough to grab a pair of medical gloves out of one of the boxes against the wall.

A nurse ran up next to me and I fell into step with her. "Dr Cox, there you are," she gasped out. It was clear by the blood on her scrubs that she had already been with the patient, and she was now carrying two IV bags of dark crimson liquid. Must be bad. "There's no other residents here, and there's no way that intern's gonna be able to handle that by herself."

"What happened?" I said as we rounded a corner.

"Fractured skull and what looks like a compound fracture in the left leg and broken ribs. Was unconscious but stable until we were in the elevator and then he crashed." We had reached the room, which was brimming with chaos, and the girl ran in front of me to hang the IV bag on the stand.

"Alright, let me in," I snapped, pushing my way between the nurse and intern. The guy looked awful. Two nurses were wrapping his mangled leg while the intern was trying to bandage the large split in his head. The ripped shirt revealed a chest that was almost solidly purple with bruising and covered in cuts, as well as the connection for the heart monitor that was flat lining. The guy was most certainly hanging on the edge of death. However, it wasn't all of that which stopped me short. There was no mistaking that blood-spattered profile.

"Newbie."

My shock didn't last long. A moment later, one of the nurses trod on my toe, sufficiently waking me up, and I instantly jumped back into action. My voice rang out over all the other noise as I took charge of the room. "His broken leg isn't gonna matter if his heart doesn't restart soon, you idiots," I yelled at the nurses and a moment later the defibrillator paddles were in my hands. The whine grew as the electricity filled them and then I pressed them against that bruised chest.

Newbie's body surged with the jolt but the monitor registered nothing. "Damn it, JD," I said, and then to the nurse, "Charge it!" A second later, the paddles were humming again and I pushed them down. The slightest flicker on the heart monitor filled me with hope and determination and I ordered the paddles charged again. It took two more tries before the line on the screen began to make a jagged, up-and-down rhythm. Even if it was unsteady and slow, it was a heartbeat. Newbie was alive.

I worked with a frenzied passion through the rest of the stabilising. As we got the various IVs into his arm, the kid's heartbeat finally steadied out and became normal. I barked angrily at the intern who was improperly bandaging the head wound, "You have to stitch it first or it's just gonna keep gushin' blood and that bandage will be worthless," before shoving her out of the way to do it myself. Mercifully, the nurses were competent enough that I didn't have to threaten them as well. I checked the broken ribs before wrapping them with the help of the older nurse and then set to stitching all of the deeper gashes that peppered the kid's body. It took more than a solid hour before we were finally finished. The end result was a Newbie who looked like the sole survivor of a WWII bombing.

The adrenaline was filtering out of my body now and I collapsed in the bedside chair. "I'll stay and make sure he stays stabilised," I said. "I don't like that arrhythmia, he might go into cardiac arrest again if we don't keep an eye on it." The others nodded, intelligent enough at least to not comment on the fact that I really should be out with the other patients. At the moment, it may have resulted in me putting one of them into a gurney in worse shape than the kid was.

"You," I said, pointing at the intern who let out a sharp squeak of fear before stifling it. "Get me a coffee and then get back to those patients." The girl nodded and scurried off, clearly grateful to get away from me in one piece. "And Jane," I added to the younger of the nurses. "You go call whatever scalpel jockey is on-call tonight and tell him to get his OR prepped so he can fix up this bloody mess."

"Alrighty, Dr Cox," she said, casting a sad glance at Newbie before leaving. I found myself wondering how well she knew the kid. Was the expression just because she knew he worked here, or even just because she was sensitive and didn't like seeing people in such bad shape? Or were she and Newbie friends? Was she sweet on him? Did he like her? It surprised me to realise just how little I actually knew about the kid's life. The kid yammered on all the time about it but I took in so little of it. Although I listened to more than I pretended I did, it still wasn't a whole lot.

I sat there silently while the older of the two nurses went about cleaning up all the blood that had dried against Newbie's skin. God, there really was a lot of it. We had managed to get the bleeding in that gash in his head to slow but the amount of loss was already so high that there were two large bags of replacement hanging from the stand, feeding blood back into that sickly white body. We'd have to get that leg properly lined up again as soon as that surgeon showed up, as well as having the stitches in his scalp redone. Still, it seemed that as long as there was no serious brain trauma and he didn't crash again sometime in the night then the kid would recover.

A few minutes later, there was a police officer standing in the doorway to the room, looking down at Newbie sadly. I jumped up and stepped out into the hall to talk to him.

"I'm Officer Burke," the policeman said.

"Dr Cox, Chief of Medicine," I replied, shaking the man's offered hand. The guy was a few years younger than me and he had a respectful professional air that managed to keep me from blowing up at him. His clothes were haphazard and wrinkled as if he'd dressed very quickly and recently enough to not have time to straighten them out.

"You know him?" the officer asked, shooting another glance into Newbie's room. "We found his name badge in his backpack, said he works here."

"Yeah, he works for me," I answered, trying to keep my tone calm and indifferent. I was not about to go all worry-mode. Not now.

The officer shook his head. "You'd think a doctor'd be smart enough to wear a seat belt." I instinctively growled under my breath but made a mental note to give the kid a lecture on that if –  _when_  – he woke up. Burke seemed alarmed by the growl and hastily cleared his throat, catching on to the fact he'd touched a sensitive spot. "Anyway, just came by to drop off his personal effects. We went through and salvaged everything we could from the car, but there wasn't a whole lot except this backpack and a bunch of empty coffee cups."

He handed me the familiar bag, which was a little ripped on one side and sported a shredded shoulder strap, as well as a plastic bag with a bunch of papers, loose pens, and a citrusy car freshener.

"Do you know what exactly happened?" I asked, unable to quell my curiosity any longer.

Burke nodded, looking grim. "Semi driver dozed off at the wheel and drifted into Mr Dor–"

" _Doctor_ ," I interrupted reflexively. Realising what I'd done, I cleared my throat and finished a little less aggressively. "It's  _Dr_  Dorian."

"Right," the officer said, nodding as if nothing had happened. "Semi drifted into Dr Dorian's lane and skimmed the side of the car. Sent it spinning off the road. Door'd been ripped off and Dr Dorian flew outta the car. He landed in the ditch on the side of the road and split his head on a rock."

I felt the colour drain from my face. My words from earlier came back to me.  _If I see you here again before your shift tomorrow you had better have cracked your skull on that aforementioned rock and are dying._  I felt as though I'd been kicked in the gut. A choked noise escaped me as all my breath rushed out.

"Yeah, he's lucky to still be here," Burke said, misinterpreting the noise. "If the car had spun the other direction he might have wound up underneath the semi. And still, if I hadn't been just a few meters behind him I don't know what would've happened. Semi driver was hysterical, had no clue what to do. I did the best I could for your doctor there, tried to stop his head bleeding while we waited for the ambulance. I didn't expect him to make it to the hospital but I'm sure glad he did." That explains the change of clothes; Newbie blood.

"Thank you." I surprised even myself with just how sincerely it came out.

The officer nodded to wordlessly accept the gratitude. "I'll be back tomorrow to see how he's doing. G'Night, Dr Cox."

He'd turned and started off before I called out after him. "The other guy, semi driver, how's he?"

Burke grimaced. "Got a cut on his forehead that'll need stitches but other than that, he's fine."

I nodded, feeling an angry fire swell up in my chest. The guy had nearly killed Newbie and was perfectly fine. The world's injustice was still intact. I was angry and it was a feeling I was used to. It was almost a form of comfort to have a reason to be mad again. "Goodnight, Officer."

With that I went back into Newbie's room, stashing the kid's stuff beneath the side table before falling into the chair. Newbie was still out but the heart monitor was reassuring with its normalcy. Gritting my teeth, my own words came back again.  _…go get your stuff and skip on home…you're gonna sleep even if you gotta bang your head re_ -he-healy _hard with a rock to do it…get the ha-_ ell _outta here…_  If I hadn't sent the kid home he wouldn't have gotten hit by that bastard. I should have just sent the kid to get a nap, listening to the assurances he'd be fine, and let it go. Surely we'd all worked this tired before. I knew I had, with two young kids and my she-witch ex-wife at home. Why hadn't I trusted the kid?

I looked up at the pale face, half-shrouded in bandages and breathing tubes. That familiar smile was still gone, this time with a helplessly limp frown in its place.  _Now get the ha-_ ell _outta here._  "I'm sorry, Newbie."

Once again, I heard that angry farewell.  _Go to hell._  I sighed heavily. "For this, kid, I can promise it."


	4. His Disappointments

_Around this place, we tend to build up a lot of expectations. Even when you have years of reality behind you, you tend to idealise what could happen: The patient will get better; The doctor will be appreciated; Lives will go back to normal when people leave this place. But the odds are against hope. At least one in three patients will probably die and eventually, they all do. Doctors are people who just serve and don't usually get a whole lot of respect for what we do, but get blamed for not changing fate. And chances are that if you wind up in this place it'll end up changing your life forever. Hope is a defence mechanism we all use to avoid the truth, even if we pretend we don't. Believing that good things can happen is what keeps us all from jumping off the roof. The problem with hope is that more often than not, you just wind up getting disappointed._

The surgeon had shown up a full fifteen minutes after being sent for, earning him one of my lectures about how his complete lack of speed could very well end up costing people their lives, which was a bad thing in case the numb-nuts didn't know. Ignoring the rant, the surgeon assessed the damage and then, with the help of a few nurses, wheeled the kid down to the OR to do his job. I threw myself into my work to keep myself distracted and ended up agitated enough that when the brainless back-up on-call idiot did finally show I ranted for a good ten minutes and nearly sent him home again before remembering I needed him. Still, even with as much work as I gave myself, I wound up walking past the OR a lot more than necessary. Finally, one of the times I passed it and peeked in the window, I saw the room was empty.

Hurriedly finishing the errand I was on, I jogged back up to Newbie's room. The surgeon had just left it and was halfway down the hall when he saw me coming toward him.

"He came out okay," the surgeon said without pre-empting. I felt myself hate the guy just a little less, although whether it was because he'd managed to  _nawt_  kill Newbie or because he'd started the conversation so I didn't have to ask and could pretend that I wasn't that concerned, I wasn't quite sure. "We went through and managed to reset his leg, although it took a lot of work 'cause there were four breaks. Nurses already got the cast on it. We checked the ribs but it looks like they managed to avoid serious damage so he should be fine there as long as he doesn't get jostled much. And we had to drill the skull to relieve a bit of blood that had pooled there, but we think it was just from the trauma and there wasn't enough that it should cause real problems. So his head's all stitched back together, and he's your problem again."

I felt any appreciation for the surgeon rush out of me faster than Satan himself, aka Bob-o, would run from a holy cross. "Thanks a lot," I said, letting my familiar sarcasm come back. And for good measure, "Jackass. Now get the hell outta here and back to that whack and slash game you play downstairs." The surgeon scowled but to his credit he only rolled his eyes and left, muttering some stream of cursing beneath his breath. I ignored this and went back into Newbie's room.

I wasn't sure what I was expecting but I was disappointed. The kid didn't really look any different from before. The bandages on his head were a little less lop-sided and bulky, and that mangled left leg was securely encased in thick white plaster. Other than that, he still looked like the severely injured victim of fate that he was. Sighing heavily, I fell down in the chair by the bed again.

It was three hours later when my pager finally went off again. I jerked awake, not even realising I'd been dozing. For a frantic moment, I was afraid it was the heart monitor above my head beeping and I was ready to call a nurse in for help before realising the noise came from my hip.

"Damn," I said loudly, reading the page. Another code. Definitely not something I could ignore. "Be back soon, Newbie," I said as I rushed out of the door. I didn't even bother to consider why I'd felt compelled to talk to the unconscious doctor. No time to deal with that internal argument. I really needed to go do my job now. Time to go save another life.

I didn't save her. I tried but the old woman just refused to come back. Finally, in an emotionless voice, I glanced at my watch and said, "Time of death: oh-four-thirty-seven, a.m." I left the nurses to get her to the morgue. Newbie had been alone for a half hour now and as I walked briskly back to the room I found himself hoping – almost wishing – that the kid might be coming around when I got there.

Once again I was disappointed. Newbie was still out but his vitals were fine. At least nothing had gotten worse. Of course with all the morphine we'd been pumping into his system it was no real shocker he was still out. No reason to start worrying yet. Trusting the stability to last a bit longer, I went into my office and retrieved a stack of previously ignored paperwork that needed to be finished, carrying it back into Newbie's room. Pulling over the little table they used to set patient's lunches on, I spread out the papers and began trying fruitlessly to get caught up on the part of my job that I had neglected for the last two days.

Occasionally the intern or nurses would stick their head in to ask me a question, and at one point the intern girl brought me a cup of luke warm coffee without my having even asked for it. Maybe she wasn't as much of a hopeless cause as I thought. Even though I still inadvertently blamed her for Newbie's condition. Beyond that, I was left mostly alone. The only other code that night ended up being a false alarm caused by a faulty heart monitor, and, very disgruntled, I went back to sitting at Newbie's bedside.

Too tired to focus on the little numbers and fine print any longer, I pushed away my papers and glanced at the clock. A quarter after six. In just a short while the regular hospital staff would be coming back to work. Barbie would come in and take over the patients she so charitably dumped on me every night. Gandhi would be loud and cocky and generally act like his usual, scalpel-pushing self. Carla would try to keep us all in our places and pester me about what was bothering me because she was just that damn psychic. Everything at Sacred Heart would be back to its normal routine except one thing: Newbie.

"One helluva night, eh Newbie?"

What in the name of oh-my-god-I'm-an-idiot is wrong with me? I'm talking to an unconscious doctor, one who had aggravated me from day one and may very well be in a coma at this point in time. I was starting to act like the kid himself. By god, I need sleep.

At the same time, I felt pressured to keep talking. Newbie had always thought that maybe coma patients could hear and understand you even if they couldn't respond. I remembered years ago when the kid had protested my talking so harshly about a coma patient in case he could hear. I'd been snide about it then, but what if there was some truth in it? While I was pretty certain that Newbie wasn't actually in a coma, what if he really could hear it? He'd want to know what was going on so when he came to he hadn't missed anything. It was ridiculous and so Newbie-ish, but it was worth a shot if it got the kid back on his feet again sooner. Besides, truth be told, I just wanted to be talking after sitting in the quiet all night with everything weighing on my mind, and Carla wouldn't be here for almost two hours.

"Just one of those nights where it seems like nothin' is gonna go right, you know," I said, resigning myself to my sleep-deprived insanity. "A few hours ago we lost Mrs Robinson." In my head, I heard Newbie humming the song from  _The Graduate_  like he'd done every time he'd heard the woman's name. I had to repress a smile at the thought. Typical Newbie. "And your interns are idiots, the whole lot of 'em. I'm glad you're the one that has to put up with them now and _nawt_  me. I got enough of it with you and Barbaroo."

Relaxing back in my chair, lacing my hands together behind my head, I looked over at the unconscious kid. He was a little less pale after five hours of having the missing blood syphoned back into him, but he didn't look any less terrible. The split in his head had been on the side where I sat so the bandaging was thicker and covered more, but the hulking mass of plaster and gauze that was his reconstructed leg was on the opposite side. I was grateful they had finally managed to get the kid into a gown because just looking at the bruising that had covered that scrawny torso made me wince. Boy did Newbie have a whole _helluva_  lot of healing ahead of him.

"You know I didn't want this to happen, don'cha?" I asked, knowing I wouldn't get an answer but feeling obligated to ask anyway. "I know I yell at ya a lot and all, but – awh hell, I'm no good at this." I stopped, rubbing a hand over my face wearily. "I guess I just feel – bad about all this. I mean – why is this still so difficult? I know they're words I ne- _hever_  say, but you're unconscious for god's sake. Not like you're gonna make a scene." It took a few seconds more before I finally managed to push the words out. "I guess I'm sorry."

_Suddenly JD sprang up in bed, grinning broadly. "You did it, you were nice to me!" he yelled and out of nowhere there was confetti and balloons falling from the ceiling. JD threw his arms around me, dragging me into a hug. "I knew you loved me!"_

I shuddered, making a noise of disgust. "Awh, Jesus, Newbie, those fantasies of yours are contagious," I drawled out in annoyance. Staring upward I muttered, "Please, God, if there's any mercy in you, just go ahead and kill me now." A tired chuckle escaped me and I leant my head on the back of the chair, slumping down so I was more comfortable and resting my feet on the corner of the hospital bed. It couldn't hurt anything to just relax for a minute, recharge so I didn't kill anyone.

I woke up abruptly when my body slipped off of the chair and I landed hard on the linoleum. I grunted at the pain it sent through my back, and rubbed my hands on my face. Apparently, I'd been sliding farther down in the chair in my sleep until gravity took over. Now my back and neck were aching and it took an effort to heave myself off the ground. Damn, getting old is a nuisance.

Newbie looked exactly like he did the when I'd fallen asleep, although maybe a little less ghostly white in the sunlight seeping through those cheap vertical blinds. God, the kid was a mess. But he was stable; he was going to come out of it eventually.

I glanced at the clock. Eight-eleven. Great, that meant the rest of the staff would be back. Time to go back out and pretend that nothing of great consequence had happened over the night. This would be much easier to fake with people there to distract myself with. Gathering my paperwork and tucking it under my arm, I walked out of the room and when I turned to head down the hall I nearly collided with a nurse.

"Wow, Dr Cox, sleeping with patients now?"

The accented retort made me look down and I grinned. Carla was staring up at me, her hands on her hips as she smiled back at me. I love that smile. Honestly, I still sorta love that woman, but that isn't a hatchet to dig up right now. I have other concerns.

"Hey Carla," I said and my sarcasm softened just for her. "And I was  _nawt_ sleeping in there, just checking in like, you know, I'm supposed to. As a doctor."

"You sure?" Carla asked, raising an eyebrow. "'Cause you look like you just woke up."

I let out a derisive laugh. "I've been on-call all night, I haven't slept enough to wake up. In fact, now that you all are here to take over I'm on my way to lock myself in my office and take a bit of a catnap while I pretend to do the more agonising part of my job." Carla was staring up at me with a look of scepticism and I knew she was on to me. Damn it, why am I so transparent to her? Usually, I loved it because she would bully me into confiding in her like I secretly wanted to do anyway, but today I wished she was a little less observant. Especially because I knew the truth would hurt her, too.

"Dr. Cox, I think we both know there's something more going on here than you're telling me. I mean, I'm not quite sure why you'd be carrying budget files if you're just 'checking in' with a patient unless you're patient is an accountant or something. But you know where I'll be if you wanna talk–"

"It's Newbie," I blurted out suddenly, cutting across her. Carla stopped short, looking up in confusion. I knew she had no idea what it was that I was talking about, but I was having a hard time getting the words to leave my mouth. Instantly, I was regretting having said anything at all, but she was the only one here I could really confide in and I needed to talk.

"Bambi? What about him? Did he piss you off again?" she asked, assuming the position she always took when I was about to get a lecture about being nicer to the kid. I looked around to make sure we were alone in the hallway. "Because–"

"No, he's the patient."

There was a stunned silence as she stared up at me, her mouth still half-opened from being in the middle of a sentence. I watched as the truth processed behind those big brown eyes. Gradually her lips came together and a look of horror took over her face. "No," she said, shaking her head. "Bambi?"

Before I could answer she had rushed past me into the room. She stopped just inside of the doorway, her hands on her mouth. I came to stand in the frame, leaning against it and folding my arms to act casual. "No. Oh no, Bambi." Cautiously, as if she was unsure whether the ground might disappear beneath her, she approached the bed and wrapped her fingers around Newbie's hand, carefully avoiding the line of stitches across its back. Wheeling on me, she began shooting questions at me in rapid Spanish.

"He was in a car wreck last night," I explained. This effectively silenced the interrogation and I hurried to push on before she got her powers of speech back. "Some idiot fell asleep and hit his car. He's got a couple broken ribs, a crack down to his skull, and multiple fractures in his leg. We had him patched up as best as we could, but now we're just waiting around for Sleeping Beauty there to wake up. Which she really needs to do, like,  _soon_  so we can find out just how much of that brain got scrambled."

Carla's eyes were still brimming with worried tears but she frowned at me. Uh oh. "Could you not ridicule him for once? God, Perry, don't you see him? You don't need to keep up your bad ass act right now so would you just lay off the insults and jokes?"

"No, Carla, I won't," I answered, trying to keep my voice emotionless although I was a little startled by her use of my first name. She usually only called me 'Perry' at work when I was in serious trouble. "I see him, okay? I've been in here all damn night because I see what he looks like. But frankly, the jokes help. It's easier because it's normal. So no, I won't lay off, because if I do I might very well have to kill someone and then I'll have to listen to Sad-Sack following me around all day stammering about lawsuits, and then I'd have to kill him too. Or maybe I'll just kill him first and save us all the trouble. But either way, the jokes stay."

"All night?" Carla asked, completely unphased by my growing anger. Her mind seemed to have only latched on to one little part of my rant. This annoyed me more because I was tired as hell and that rant had taken a lot more effort than usual, but she'd hardly been paying attention. Now her eyes drifted to the paperwork in my arm and the empty coffee cup still sitting on the patient's table, then to the chair beside the bed before finally resting on me again.

"Do whatever makes this easier on you, Dr. Cox," she said in a smoother voice. Her fingers moved to brush a loose curl away from Newbie's face even though it was stuck in the bandaging and just flipped back into place the moment her hand lifted. Then she turned and walked out of the room, patting me on the arm as she passed and giving me a small smile that told me everything was fine between us again. The message in her eyes was clear enough; I knew where she was for when I finally needed to cave and talk about my night.

"Thanks, Carla," I said, closing the door behind us. "Oh, and when you break it to Gandhi could you try to keep him calm, because we really don't need him getting all hysterical? Bethany there needs some peace and quiet. And if we could just find the tranquillizers to use on Barbie that'd save us a  _whole_  lot of trouble and ear damage." Carla only smiled and nodded before walking away in a remarkably composed way. I had to admire just how strong she was.

Deciding I wasn't in that much of a hurry to get back to my office just yet, I crossed the hall and leant up against the wall opposite the window of Newbie's room. From this far away the kid just looked like any other patient, and it allowed me to be just a doctor. Forget that the kid had been my loyal shadow for over seven years. Distance myself. And from a purely medical standpoint, my hopes for the kid were bleak. There were so many things that were just begging to go wrong in there. That shattered leg might be beyond complete repair and either leave him limping his whole life or even need to be amputated if it didn't fuse back together right. The arrhythmia had eased a little but could still cause another bout of cardiac arrest we might not be able to stop in time. Those broken ribs could do serious damage to his lungs if he moved too much. That head injury could have caused massive brain damage, the results of which were so many different horrible things that I didn't even want to list them to myself. Either way, Newbie's outlook was not the most promising thing.

And Sacred Heart scores another against hope.

I only made it far enough away to get a large cup of black coffee before deciding I needed to go check on the kid again. As much as I hated it, I couldn't stand to be that far away until I knew Newbie was gonna wake up. At least then things would be definitive. Sipping at the scalding drink, I reached the room and saw my chair had already been occupied.

Gandhi was sitting at the bedside, staring at his best friend in clear shock. There was that blank look that I had seen so many times. That calm vacancy before the truth fully sets in. I watched as the surgeon's expression filled with terror and sadness, a single tear appearing on his cheek before he brushed it off. Then he closed his eyes and leant his face against his clasped hands, muttering under his breath. It took me a few seconds to realise what he was doing; praying.

"Don't take JD, he's never done anything to deserve it," Gandhi was saying. "He might be a bit crazy but he's the best friend anyone in the world could ask for. He is always helping people, even when he doesn't get anything in return for it. Please." The rest of his words trailed off and I heard the shaking breath of someone trying to suck back sobs.

"You know he does get something in return," I finally spoke up, making Gandhi jump in fright. He stood up quickly, brushing his hands over his eyes again.

"Oh, hey, Dr Cox," he stammered. "I was just – what were you saying?"

"I was saying he does get something in return for it all," I said, forcing myself to keep the sarcasm out of my voice. Even if it was the idiot Gumball in front of me, he was still someone grieving an injured family member and that meant I should really be a professional about this, personal feelings aside. "Newbie does. He gets his jollies off helping people. It just makes him happy to help out."

"I know," Gandhi said, giving a watery chuckle. "That's why he became a doctor." He cleared his throat again. "What happened? Carla said something about an accident but I – uh – didn't hear her."

"Already running down here when she said it?" I asked, already guessing the answer. The embarrassed look on Gandhi's face confirmed it. "He was in a car wreck last night heading home. Semi driver dozed off at the wheel and got Newbie's car. Just thank God he doesn't drive that little femmy motorcycle on oestrogen that he used to."

It was while I was running through the list of Newbie's injuries and the effects when I first heard it. A groan. I paused mid-sentence, looking down at Newbie. The kid didn't look like he'd moved at all but where else could the noise have come from? Was it someone's stomach growling? I hadn't eaten in a while, now I thought about it. But then there it was again, and I saw the corners of the kid's eyes wrinkle as his eyes squeezed just a bit tighter.

"Newbie, you awake in there?" I asked. Groan. "C'mon, Shirley, up you get. Can you open your eyes for me?" Newbie groaned again, followed by a cough which instantly elicited another groan. "Yeah, easy there, Skippy, your ribs are pretty banged up. Now open your eyes, if you can." The kid's facial muscles were twitching as if he was trying to remember how to work them all. His eyes squinted tighter shut, jaw clenched and unclenched, nostrils flared and drew in an over-compensating whiff of the oxygen cannula. Then finally he managed to pry his eyes open just a fraction before shutting them again.

"Ow," Newbie moaned. His right arm fidgeted like he was going to cover his eyes but the heavy morphine hadn't worn off and his arm never lifted.

"Gandhi, get the blinds, lights," I snapped and the surgeon instantly complied, dousing both lights so we were bathed in semi-darkness. "Now c'mon, JD, open your eyes again. Slow if you have to. Just try to focus on me." It took Newbie a few more tries before he finally opened his eyes enough to look around the room.

"There's my Vanilla Bear," Gandhi said, his relief and excitement all too evident in his voice. I was just as relieved but struggled to not show it, shushing the surgeon. Newbie was looking around as though trying to figure out just where he was. Probably trying to figure out why he was there.

"Okay, Newbie, focus here again," I said and the blue eyes swivelled back to lock on my face. At least the kid was responsive and able to focus. That was two checks off the brain damage list. "Welcome back, Delilah. You had us going there for a while."

"Ha, nothing takes out my V-Bear," Gandhi proclaimed proudly. He was practically flying in his exhilaration. "I knew you'd make it out of this okay, buddy." There was a vague smile on Newbie's face as his eyes continued to search around the room and I felt a wave of hope and relief washing over me. The kid had made it back scot-free.

"Wha - Who are you?"

Or not.


	5. His Sucker Punches

_Having your whole world thrown into chaos is never a good thing, but the thing about those moments where it seems like things can't get worse is that they always do. You are always thinking there is no way this could possibly get worse and then your dog dies or the Red Wings lose or, if the day is being totally cliché, it starts raining. It's like even after you've had the rug ripped out from under your feet and you're lying stunned on the ground, there's someone standing over you and punching you in the gut every time you think you'll recover._

I knew that my mouth was open but at the moment my brain was just a little too stunned to do anything about it. Newbie was glancing from my gaping expression to Gandhi's and looking even more confused. He squirmed awkwardly under our stares and it was when he hissed in pain that I snapped out of it. My jaw closed so fast my teeth clicked painfully.

Gandhi suddenly let out a hesitant chuckle. "Ha, good one, V-Bear," he said, laughing in disbelief. There was something oddly forced in his tone. Denial. "Funny."

"What?" Newbie asked, his brow furrowing until that made him wince as well. "Ow, God, what happened? Where – where am I?"

Drawing back in every ounce of professionalism I could muster, I cleared my throat before Gumball could confuse the kid worse. "Sacred Heart hospital," I answered. There seemed to be some sort of recognition in the kid's eyes but he didn't react. "Well, you hit your head pretty hard so I'm gonna ask you some questions, just to check everything's still working up there, okay?" I asked and received a sort of twitch I assumed was supposed to be a nod. "They're easy questions, no trivia. First off, do you know your name?"

Newbie's eyebrow arched as he puzzled over this for a second and I felt my hopes fading. Oh god, the kid didn't even know his own name. "It's like, it's there I just can't get to it," Newbie said, clearly frustrated. "My head's all fuzzy."

"That's probably because of the gallon of morphine ya got in ya, Lucille." I instantly regretted snapping at the kid, and I got an angry glare from the scalpel jockey for it as well, but it was just what I did when I was upset. Coping mechanism. Newbie, my Newbie who'd been there like the plague for all those years, had no idea who I was and that hadn't quite sunk in just yet.

To my surprise, Newbie chuckled. Or at least I assumed it was a chuckle although it came out sounding like a hoarse choke. But he was smiling. "Okay, well, I do know that's  _not_  my name, so that's something," he said simply. He cleared his throat, choking on a cough. "Hey, can I get a glass of water or something?"

"Sure," I said, nodding. "Gandhi, fetch." The surgeon glared at me again but did as he was told.

Just after Gandhi had gotten past the door the kid suddenly smiled. "John," he said, grinning like an idiot at his little victory. "That's it. I'm John. Right?"

"Good job there, Patty," I said. Damn, I really needed to stop doing that. I had to remind myself that this wasn't my Newbie sitting there, this was a very confused patient who had no idea who I was, let alone that being called a girl's name was a daily occurrence. However, I was once again surprised when the kid laughed.

"You know, it's not every day your doctor calls you girls' names," Newbie said with a hint of humour.  _Oh, the bitter irony in that._

"Sorry, bad habit," I said dismissively. I turned to grab the chart from the end of the bed and began perusing it blankly. I'd actually read it about a dozen times over the night, on top of having been the one to fill it out, but this was only so I had a reason to not be looking at Newbie. Seeing him made this harder. "Alright, kid, can you tell me what happened to you?"

"You're the doc, I thought that was your job," Newbie said with a bit of a sarcastic smile.

I couldn't help the quiet chuckle. "Nice one, smart ass," I said. "I'm testing your memory. Do you remember?"

The smile faded as the kid took on a more thoughtful look. "All I'm getting is panic and then pain. Some bright lights and then – darkness I think. Nothing clearer than that." Newbie frowned and then his smile suddenly came back, even if it was a little lazy from the drugs. "Was I hit by the train at the end of the tunnel?"

I tried very hard not to smile at that before reminding myself the kid didn't remember that I worked hard to  _nawt_  find him funny. "Close," I conceded. "Car wreck."

"Hmm, my second guess." There was more silence as I pretended to make notes on the clipboard, even though the cap was still on my pen. "The other people, from the accident, were they okay?" Newbie asked suddenly, concerned.

"Yeah, he was fine," I said, barely disguising the anger that flared in me at this. "Had to get some stitches on his forehead but that's it. He's probably being discharged as we speak."

"Oh, good," Newbie said, smiling.

I laughed. "Newbie, you are a weird one," I said, shaking my head, ignoring the look of confusion at the nickname he obviously didn't recognise. "The guy nearly kills you when he steamrolls your car and you're just concerned about whether he got hurt."

"I'm that bad off?" Newbie stopped to glance down but laying prone he obviously couldn't see much of his body. "I can't tell. It's all sorta – fuzzy and numb like my brain."

"That would be the morphine," I said. "We have you on a pretty high dosage or else you'd probably be in serious pain right now. Your left leg was broken in four places, you have a couple broken ribs and a total of eighty-something stitches including the fifty that are holding your head together since it was nearly split into two pieces."

Newbie winced. "Ouch, guess I did get the bad end," he said. "You sure don't sugarcoat things much, do ya?" His eyelids were fluttering and he seemed to be putting a great deal of effort into keeping them up. "God, I'm tired."

"Get some sleep," I said firmly. "Your body needs it to recover. When you wake up again I'll have the neurologist come up and finish your testing. Maybe you'll be able to remember a little better with some rest."

"Hmm, okay," Newbie said, his eyes already closing. "Thanks, uh…"

That simple hesitancy drove home the point that I'd been having a hard time grasping onto. Newbie really had no clue who I was. Sucker punch. "Dr Cox," I offered.

"Right. Thanks, Dr Cox." And within a matter of seconds, Newbie was asleep again.

I was just walking back out of the room when Gandhi appeared with a paper cup full of ice chips. "Sorry, ice machine on this floor is empty again so I had to run down to the next floor," he said by way of answer, glancing past me into the room. "I – I suppose I'll just leave it on the table then." Gandhi went in to set the cup down and stayed at the bedside for a minute, staring down at his best friend. When he finally came back to stand outside with me, he was rubbing at his eyes.

"You gonna be alright there, Gumball?"

"He really doesn't remember me?" The note of desperation in his voice stirred the faintest sense of compassion in my chest. If I was feeling bad about Newbie forgetting us all, it couldn't be anything compared to the man who was practically married to him.

"Doesn't look like it," I admitted. "Probably a bit of retrograde amnesia from hitting his head. It may come back with time and rest but I don't know. These cases usually have a fifty-fifty chance. Guess we just gotta wait and see. I'll let you know what the verdict is after the neurologist gets a look at him."

"Thanks," Gandhi said. He was still looking just a little bit lost, like a kid who'd wandered away from his mum at the grocery store and only just realised he had no idea where she was.

"You need to take a bit of a break before you get to work?" I asked. "I can have them jumble your surgeries around if you don't think you can take it right now."

"Nah, gotta be doing something," Gandhi said. "Need to be doing somethin' with myself or I'm gonna go nuts worrying, ya know?"

I nodded. That, at least, was something I could understand. "I'll page you when we get some news," I said simply. Gandhi gave me a grateful nod and then left to start his day. I cast a short glance through the window into Newbie's room one last time before heading for my office. I had a lot to get done, starting with digging up Newbie's personnel files so I could finish filling out the charts as well as find a number to call his family.

In my office, I tossed the manila folders I'd been carrying onto the desk and headed to the filing cabinet in the corner. I grasped the handle of the top drawer, its off-white label proclaiming 'A-E' in sloppy black marker, and jerked it open. The dull rattle of the drawer as it glided clumsily out made me grit my teeth as the piercing shriek of metal on metal shot through my headache. Shaking it off, I found the folder marked 'Dorian, John M.' and pulled it out, opting to leave the drawer open so I wouldn't have to endure that noise again when I needed to put the folder away later. Then I sank down into my desk chair and flipped through the papers inside.

Most of it was a bunch of gibberish about the kid's different medical trainings and certifications. There were a few old forms from mortality and morbidity conferences and a suspension form with a large void stamped on it. Finally, I found what I was looking for. Medical records from things like his appendectomy, the form from his most recent physical, and his personal contact information sheet.

Scanning down to the emergency contact number, I found myself uncertain whether to laugh or roll my eyes, so I settled on doing both.

' _Name: Christopher Turk_

_Relation: Brotha'_

"Oh God, Newbie, you're killing me," I said, shaking my head. However, this presented a bit of a moral dilemma. Newbie had listed his emergency contact as Gandhi, so I was under no legal obligations to proceed any further now that the proper person was informed. But on the other hand, I knew Dan and felt that the if-possible-more-moronic Dorian brother needed to know what had happened. The biggest road block? I had no idea how to get a hold of Dan because there was no number and I couldn't just go in and ask Newbie because at the moment it seemed unlikely that the kid would even remember he  _had_  a brother.

 _Don't think like that,_ I chided himself mentally.  _When the kid wakes up he'll have remembered everything. It was just because of all the drugs. He's fine._  I knew I was in denial but it was easier than having to deal with this right now. Deciding that there was nothing more I could do for now, I grabbed the medical paperwork and returned to Newbie's room. The kid was still sound asleep so I filled out the blank parts of the chart for pre-existing medical conditions and medicine allergies as best as I could.

A grumble from the bed made me look up, thinking Newbie had woken up again already, but the kid was still asleep. His face scrunched up and he muttered something groggily. I muffled my laugh. The kid was a sleep-talker. It wasn't that much of a surprise, really, but it was kind of amusing to know. I thought back, trying to remember if I'd ever heard the kid talking while he was asleep in the on-call room. No, it was mostly only those random outbursts when he got woken up or pulled out of Dolly DaydreamLand.

"Cox."

The word stopped me short. For a second I was wondering whether the kid had said my name or 'cocks' but I quickly brushed that away. As much as I ridiculed the kid's femininity, I didn't actually think he was gay enough to talk about stuff like that in his sleep. But the reality still struck me. In his dreams, the kid was calling out for me. Just like Newbie always had every waking moment he'd spent in this hospital. Newbie couldn't remember who I was, but he still needed me. Sucker punch again.

"Cox."

Approaching the bed, I leant over and lowered my voice. "What is it, Newbie?" I asked in a whisper.

There were a few unintelligible mumbles but I caught the last word. "…lost." Double gut punch. In his vulnerable state, Newbie was calling out for his mentor to help him. He'd just forgotten his entire world, essentially lost everything he'd ever known, and he wanted my help. And damn it, I'd used the 'm' word again and not even noticed.

"I know, kid," I said slowly. "I know you're lost but we're gonna get you through this. You're gonna get better and then you won't be lost. I'll help you, I promise it."

Newbie seemed to relax at this and the creases at the corners of his eyes eased. He murmured something more but I didn't catch it, and then the kid was as still as the dead while he slept on. There was the ghost of a smile on his face as he dreamed. I rolled my eyes and left the room, wondering how anyone in the world could have dreams and be anxious enough to sleep-talk while there was that much morphine being systematically pumped into their systems. But then again, it didn't surprise me much that the person to be so unconventional and against humanity's norm would be Newbie. He always had been one of a kind, in his weird, quirky, highly effeminate way.

I threw myself into my work for the rest of the morning, dealing with patients instead of paperwork because sitting at a desk was too stagnant and allowed me to get sidetracked, although I had to down another coffee every two hours to keep myself conscious after my four hours of sleep for a horribly trying day. Whenever I passed, I would peek into Newbie's room but the kid was still out like a light even five hours after he'd gone to sleep. Even with my shortened fuse, my bedside manner might have been improved because I felt just too drained to give out the lectures to the idiotic patients who seemed to be hell-bent on destroying their own lives by smoking or eating their own weight in red meat every day or ignoring the strange rash they were developing until their skin started falling off. By the time I finally got my lunch break at three, I was in no mood for company and I took my food up to the roof.

It was another unexpected blow to the head to step up onto that roof. It was the last place I'd seen Newbie before the accident. The place where I'd tried to convince the kid to help himself out by getting some much-needed sleep. The place where I had self-sabotaged my own plan and wound up with a faceful of spit and a whiplash of hatred. The place where I'd said those bitter, condescending words that would be the last Newbie heard from me before nearly dying. The place where I'd been so sure that Newbie would thank me for it all later. I was now seriously doubting that Newbie would thank me if he knew the accident was my fault.

Crossing to the ledge where Newbie had been standing the night before, I set my lunch on the concrete and leant against it. I stared down into the parking lot, full of far more cars than the last time I'd seen it, and at the meds vs. surgeon basketball game going on below me. My appetite was poor but the gnawing sensation in my stomach reminded me that I hadn't eaten in about twenty hours and my medical instincts were flashing red lights at me. I ate the sandwich without much enthusiasm and sipped at the fruit juice, wishing desperately that it was a scotch. At least the alcohol would dull the ache in my chest from receiving so many invisible right hooks in the last twenty-four hours.


	6. His Fleeting Fancies

_In a hospital, you have to seize onto those few hopeful things you come across. They are a rare thing in themselves when it seems like almost every turn has you running headlong into bad news. On top of that, hopeful moments hardly last more than a few seconds. You have to enjoy the good things before another dose of bad comes and pops the happy balloon over your head. As a doctor, you learn to really drink in those fleeting good moments because they are the only things that keep your head above water when all the bad comes back for you._

"You okay?"

The voice made me jump and I felt the fruit juice slip out of my hand, which was currently suspended in open air over the edge of the hospital. My eyes watched its spinning downward decent as it rained juice over the basketball game below. A handful of angry cries went up from the players and as they looked up I ducked down behind the concrete ledge.

"Better now, thanks, Carla," I answered, turning around to sit with my back to the ledge while the guys below continued to shout. Carla laughed and came to sit next to me. "How'd you find me?"

"Lucky guess," Carla said but there was a playful, knowing look in her eyes that said she knew more but was going to enjoy keeping it from him. "I can't believe I actually surprised you, normally you always notice when someone comes up behind you." I thought over this and realised she had a point. This whole mess had gotten me so distracted I was losing my powers. Can't let that happen, gotta get my head back in the game. "What are you doing up here?"

My smile flickered, remembering having said basically the same thing to Newbie last night. "Getting away from people for a bit," I said, shrugging. "Just  _nawt_  a day to have to deal with all of that stupid chaos and whatnot. Thought I'd take a bit of a break from them."

"And dump drinks on the guys in the parking lot?"

I grinned. "Well, that was not the initial plan. You helped me come up with that one by scaring the hell outta me, popping up outta nowhere faster than Jordan can mood-swing. However, I'll admit hearing them having a fit down there was so _-ho_ worth the two dollars and measly sip of my drink I got."

Carla laughed, pulling her knees up to her chest and resting her arms on them. "How's Bambi?" she asked and her tone was one of forced composure. "I haven't heard from Turk since he ran off to check on him."

"He woke up," I said, trying to keep that from sounding like too good a thing so it wouldn't crush as badly when I went on. Despite my attempt, Carla was looking over at me hopefully. "But he's got amnesia."

The silence that followed was almost identical to the one when I'd first told Carla about Newbie's car wreck. Thankfully it lasted a few seconds less. "Amnesia?"

I nodded. "Didn't recognise me or even Turtle-head," I said and couldn't hide the sigh that escaped me. "Took him about two minutes to remember his own name, and then he only remembered his first name."

"But he did remember it," Carla pointed out, her voice filling with false hope. "So that could mean it's just taking a while coming back. Right?"

"It could," I agreed. "I suppose it's possible. I mean his personality is all still there. He acts just like his usual self. But it was creepy to see him look at me like I was a complete stranger."

Carla gave a small laugh. "Why, 'cause you're so used to the adoration and respect?"

"Well,  _yeah_ , that's ex- _act-_ ly it." I tried to say it casually, playing along with her joke, but unfortunately, the Latina nurse was not one to be fooled so easily after all these years.

"It must be hard for you, seeing JD like that," she said with exaggerated slowness.

"I know what you're trying to do, Carla. It won't work."

To her benefit, she didn't bother with faking innocence. "Look, Perry, I know you care about JD even though you're too much of a hard-ass to admit it," she said firmly. "I know you spent the whole night in JD's room with him. The night nurses told me," she added in answer to my raised eyebrows. "We both know there's something serious going on with you. So just tell me and save yourself the grief of fighting with me when he both know you secretly want to lose anyway."

"It was my fault." The admission left me before I had time to think about it. I really needed to figure out how she made me do that. That was the third time so far today. Carla stared at me, clearly confused. "Newbie's accident. It was my fault." Having finally admitted the truth left me feeling deflated and almost weak. Or as close to that as possible, because I, Percival Ulysses Cox, am ne- _ever_ weak.

Carla was quiet for a moment, letting me collect myself. "Is this the part where you tell me why he was out driving while he was supposed to be on-call? And I swear to you, if it was because you sent him out on some errand to find a pizza place that was still open after midnight so you could get your anchovy fix, I am going to have to kill you."

I gave a choked laugh. "No, although I almost wish I had because then I could feel guilty enough to just walk outta here and into the nearest bar. And don't think I haven't thought about it anyway," I added quickly, catching Carla's expression. "But the thing is, I wasn't being self-absorbed this time. I was  _trying_  to be nice. I just told him to go home and sleep 'cause he was exhausted, but he got his panties all bunched up and so I yelled at him and sent him home and told him to hit his head with a rock so he'd sleep. So what does he do? Go wreck his car and bash his skull in on a rock so he can throw my words back at me and make me feel guilty."

"Yeah, I'm sure  _that's_  why he did it," Carla said sarcastically, rolling her eyes at me.

"My point is," I pressed on, giving her a half-hearted glare. She was about the only person who could always get away with interrupting me, except Jordan but that's because she could and would physically harm me. "If I hadn't pushed him so hard to leave then he wouldn't have been out on the road and gotten hit. I should have trusted him to ask for a break if he really needed it. And I was so intent on helping that I ignored the common sense that says don't put a guy who's so tired he can't see straight behind the wheel of a car."

"That  _is_  stupid."

"You know, you are  _so_  great at making me feel better," I said, shaking my head. "I was just – I don't offer to help a lot so when I did and he just blew it off I got defensive. And I never even bothered to find out why he was in such a bad mood either. For once, he wasn't gushing out eh- _hevery_  detail of his life to me. I mean, he never said why he had that huh- _uge_  bruise on his head, or that the Marks' girl's results came back and she's gonna die. He was cold to me every time I talked to him and the rest of the time he was avoiding me like a disease. You know he told me to 'blow it out my ass?'"

"Yeah, he really is taking after you," she said, shaking her head sadly.

"I know," I said, remembering the startling realisation I'd been hit with the night before. "I don't like it."

"Hm, I figured you would've been pleased. A little ego fluffing never bothered you before."

I frowned. "I always pushed the kid to become as good a  _doctor_  as me, not to actually  _be_  me. This place can only handle one Dr Cox."

"Amen," Carla agreed and I shoved her with my shoulder. "Well, it's true!" Then her smile became more serious and she put a hand on my arm. "You can't keep blaming yourself for this, you know," she said. "It wasn't your fault. The only person worth blaming is the idiot in the other car. But you were trying to take care of Bambi, he really did need the sleep. You couldn't have known what was going to happen. And who knows, something good might come of this. After all, everything happens fo–"

"Oh dear God, puh _-leeze_  don't say 'for a reason,'" I begged dramatically. Then I glanced skyward. "Sorry, Laverne."

"I'm just saying," Carla continued, but her smile had returned, "that you can't keep beating yourself up about this. I know how bad you get when you feel guilty. Look what happened with those three patients that–"

"Don't remind me," I interjected quickly.

Carla nodded. "Well, it was JD who eventually got you through that," she said. "And who knows, maybe he will do it again somehow. But the point is, you have to get yourself together so you can be a good doctor for him. And maybe helping him get better will clear that conscience of yours. I know that JD would forgive you for this and now you need to forgive yourself. He needs you to."

We simply sat together in the quiet for a long while, both of us thinking. I was dwelling on her words. Nobody could drive a point home for me quite like Carla could. For some reason there was just a way that she phrased things, or maybe it was her tone, or maybe it was just her, but for some reason whenever she lectured me the message actually sunk in. Just like it did this time. I knew Newbie wouldn't hold a grudge against me, so I shouldn't either.

Of course, thinking it was a  _helluva_  lot easier than actually putting those thoughts into action.

"I never even asked," I said, suddenly realising. "How are you holding up?"

Carla's smile was sad. "I'm okay," she said without much conviction. "I feel a bit better now that he's awake and seems to be okay. You know, other than the amnesia thing. I'm more concerned about keeping Turk from freaking out." She paused thoughtfully, resting her chin on the hand that was still on my arm. "It's just so weird to see JD hurt. He's always the one that's happy and energetic and keeping all the rest of us together. He's the one who fixes us when we're fighting and when we're hurting. And now suddenly  _he's_  the one who's hurt."

"One crazy version of karma, ain't it?" I asked with a laugh. I got a playful slap to the chest in reply. "I don't know why it bugs you. I know I've spent a lot of time taking care of him, and I'm sure you've put in more than your share of hours looking after your little fawn."

"But we're there to help him grow up and be a better doctor and a better person," Carla said. "There's a difference between taking care of him as doctors like now and taking care of him as friends."

"Whoa whoa  _whoa_ , hold the phone there, precious," I said. "Did I eh- _hever_  say that Newbie was my friend? Because if so it must have been during one of those times when I was so drunk you could convince me to say something as ridiculous as 'I love my soul-sucking banshee of an ex-wife,' in which case it doesn't count on account of I was comp _-le-he-he-he-hetely_  wasted."

Carla looked up at me in that way that said all too clearly that she thought I was full of shit. "But you  _do_  love your ex-wife," she said as if it was obvious.

I had opened my mouth to respond but found myself momentarily speechless. Damn, how did she do that? "Irrelevant," I said finally. "I still never said it." Carla laughed and I felt as if a weight on my chest had been relieved. Even though nothing in the world had gotten better and none of our problems had resolved themselves during their talk, it just felt like I was so much better equipped to deal with them. Hope had filled me. I could get through this, and things would get better from here.

"Thanks," I said quietly and Carla didn't need to ask for what. She merely smiled with her cheek against my bicep and we both instinctively knew that the other was going to be fine.

The blissful moment was broken when the pager on my belt went off again. Groaning, I lifted it, swearing that I would kill someone if it was some idiot intern bugging me for something pointless. Instead, it read:  _ICU 204 awake, asking for you._

"Newbie's up," I said and felt Carla straighten up beside me. I was already paging the neurologist to meet me at the room as soon as he could while I stood up. Then I pulled Carla up next to me and we moved wordlessly to the stairs. Three minutes later, we had gotten to Newbie's room and Carla stepped aside to let me in first. I rounded the corner into the room and found Newbie propped up in the bed. A wide smile broke out on the younger doctor's face as our gazes locked.

"I remember you!"

The exclamation caught me off-guard and I paused, looking sceptical. "I would hope so, Charlotte," I said, stepping up to stand at the end of the bed. "I was only in here this morning. Your memory's in worse shape than we thought if you'd forgotten me already."

Newbie's smile hadn't faded. "No, I mean I remember you from before the accident."

I thought for a second I'd been hit in the face with a bedpan or something. It couldn't be; this was impossible. Newbie had really remembered me. Something in that battered memory of his had registered and latched on to his old mentor. I didn't even care that I'd thought the word 'mentor' again because Newbie was getting better. Finally, I managed to gasp out a, "You do?"

"Well, sort of," Newbie admitted. "I mean I don't remember a lot, but I feel so certain that I knew you before I met you this morning. I don't know where from or who you are in relation to me or anything, but I did know you. I'm right, aren't I?"

It took me a long time to summon up the words. "Yeah, kid, we knew each other," I said, trying to hide my disappointment. Still, it was progress, even if it wasn't much.

"Ha, I knew it," Newbie said excitedly. "So how do I know you exactly?"

"I probably shouldn't say just yet," I said slowly. Newbie looked put out. "Sorry, Julie, but until we get the clearance from the neuro-guy I can't really say much on it. Just for safety's sake."

Newbie made a motion that might have been a shrug. "Well, if you're the first person I remember knowing, you must either be family or my best friend," he reasoned. "And since you don't look much like I think I do, then I'm gonna guess best friend."

I gave a short chuckle, hit again by the irony as I remembered the many times I had ridiculed the kid for that very notion over the years. "Not exactly, but nice logic," I commented.

Newbie looked confused but at that moment he looked around and spotted Carla hovering in the door. "Oh, hi, sorry, I got so excited I didn't notice you," he said quickly. "Sorry."

"It's okay, Bamb–" Carla seemed to stop herself at the last second. "JD."

"What were you going to call me?" Newbie asked curiously, his grin widening. "Bamm-bamm? Do I like the Flintstones, or break things a lot or something?"

"Well, you break things," I put in from where I was checking over the IVs, "but that wasn't what she was saying."

"Bambi," Carla finally said and she came over to stand by the bed.

"So I must know you too," Newbie remarked and he was staring intently at her face as if looking for some important clue that would trigger it. "Unless you guys give nicknames to all your patients."

"They do that, too," I said. I got an annoyed, "Perry," from Carla that effectively silenced me. At least for now.

"You're one to talk," Newbie said with a laugh. "You have a different name for me every other sentence." This time sent Carla laughing behind her hand but before the conversation could get any farther the neurologist arrived and, a minute later, Carla and I had slipped out into the hall so he could do his tests. Carla promptly got called back to work but everyone that even thought of approaching me got growled at and instantly walked away, so when the neurologist emerged a half hour later I was still lingering in the hall, pretending to look through a patient's file.

"Dr Cox," the neurologist said and I looked up, feigning annoyance at being disturbed. "Well, it looks just like you suspected, a case of retrograde amnesia. It's a bit of a peculiar case because it seems like he remembers particular bits and pieces of information. He knows his name and he told me there are people he sees that he thinks he knows but doesn't know how or from when. He mentioned you in particular. I don't think he realises he's doing it, but he still talks like a doctor, with all the right terms and such. That could mean that everything is still in there and he just can't consciously access it." The man paused, glancing over his shoulder at Newbie's room before shaking his head.

"Well, that's all fine and dandy, there, but you wanna give me some information that I didn't already know?" I asked, touching my thumb to my nose and then folding my arms. "Is it going to get better?"

"I don't see why it shouldn't," the doctor said with a shrug. "I mean there is the vague possibility it won't because he hasn't shown a whole lot of progress yet. It's difficult to gauge exactly how the human mind will work."

"I thought that was the point of your job," I said sarcastically.

The other doctor simply rolled his eyes and continued. "The point is, it seems very likely that his memories will at least mostly return with time. You can help him if you feel the need. Perhaps bring in some family photographs or things that he was attached to. I would normally recommend taking him home to see where he lived and if anything there triggered his memory, but in his condition, it may be a while before its safe for him to leave. But don't pressure him into remembering, it may cause his brain to stop processing the information and close off doors if you try to make him remember too fast. The photos and such are only to aid in the process, not push it forward."

I nodded silently, taking in this information. It was all basically what I had assumed from the start. That Newbie  _might_  get better. It was all still a fifty-fifty chance. My hopes of having the neurologist tell me otherwise had faded and it was back to the same old sit-and-wait game. "Okay thanks, doctor," I said and nodded. The other doctor returned the farewell and headed back toward the elevators while I watched him go. And with him went the hopes of a definitive fate for Newbie.


	7. His Mr. Grumpy Face

_When you become a bit desensitised to the effects of working in a hospital over the years, you begin to find it a lot harder to find good things to smile at. It still hits you hard when the person you're tending to dies despite all your efforts, but even when you get to cure someone and send them home safely the victory feels hollow because you're all too aware of what complications might come back or the fact that in the end that person is going to die just the same. It's all just prolonging the inevitable. The longer you slave away saving lives, the harder and harder it gets to smile. Which is why when you find something that can bring a little cheer to your day you had damn well best enjoy it as much as you can, even if that rarely-used smile is a little reluctant in following that warm fuzzy feeling._

It took me a few minutes after getting the news from Dr –  _oops, never did get his name_  – Dr Neuro-guy before going back into Newbie's room. The kid was just sitting there, watching the door as expectantly as if he'd been told a naked supermodel was going to walk past at some point of the day and he might miss it if he looked away. He smiled when he saw me. Oh great,  _I'm_  the naked model.

"What's up, Doc?" he asked and then laughed at his own lame joke. "So, it's amnesia, isn't it?"

"Good guess, Wendy," I said, trying not to laugh as well. Amnesia was not a funny matter but the kid was so carefree and nonchalant about it that it almost made me wish I could feel that way as well. Oh sweet Jesus, I just said that I wanted to be like Newbie. Someone save me. "But he said it looks like your memory should eventually come back and you'll be back to normal."

"That's a relief," Newbie said, carefully snuggling himself more comfortably into the pillows. "So, do I have a lot of friends around this place? 'Cause it seems like everyone that comes in here knows me already."

"Yeah, you're known around here," I admitted. "So don't be surprised if some more people come in here to talk to you. Try not to let them get you too overwhelmed, 'kay Patricia? If they start messing with your head too much just tell 'em you wanna sleep and if they don't scoot on out the door then you go ahead and page a nurse to chase 'em out."

Newbie laughed. "Hm, okay, sounds good," he said. "So wait, did he say that you guys can actually talk to me about – you know –  _me_ , or am I still supposed to be kept in the dark?"

"No, we can talk now," I said. "So long as you don't get an information overload and all that knowledge splits your precious little girly head open again. What'd'ya wanna know?"

"So my last name's Dorian, right?" Newbie asked.

I bit down on the inside of my cheek, not sure whether I was about to laugh or scream in frustration. "Yeah, that'd be you," I finally said in a level tone.

"Just checking 'cause Dr North called me  _Dr_  Dorian when he came in and it sorta threw me for a loop," Newbie said with a half smile. "So I'm a doctor. That's sah- _weet_. Guess that explains why I keep picking up all these random, big words. I say them without realising I even know them. Cool but creepy. Weird I remember that and not everything else."

"Yeah, well, being a doctor sort of defined who you are, Ginger," I said with a shrug, trying not to reveal that I was just as baffled by it as the next person. Even I thought my answer was a load of bull, the kid seemed to accept it and I convinced myself that I could acknowledge it as the truth for now too.

Newbie's smile was sad for a second. "I don't even remember if it was what I wanted to do. I can't remember having childhood career dreams at all. Like, if I ever wanted to be something else or what it was." He paused hesitantly. "Do you know – I mean, if you knew me well, was I a good doctor?"

I was at a loss for words. It was against my character to supply Newbie with a compliment just because he asked for it -  _especially_  when he asked for it - but this situation seemed so different. This wasn't the normal Newbie; this was a guy who had lost his entire history and was looking for some shred of hope. "Yeah, kid, you're a great doctor," I said sincerely.

Then there it was, that full-blown Newbie grin. "Thanks."

It surprised me how much satisfaction I got out of seeing that smile again. Normally it drove me insane the way the kid was always grinning like a clown at the stupidest little things, but today it was almost a relief to see it. All day yesterday it had been frustrated frowns or angry scowls. Having that smile back almost made it seem like something in the world was normal again.

"Anyway, Brooke, I've got a job to be doing but I'll come by again later to see how you're doing," I said, hanging the charts back on the foot of the bed. "Until then I'll have Carla keep an eye on you to make sure you don't get bothered too much." Newbie looked confused. "The nurse that was in here with me earlier. The one that calls you 'Bambi.'"

"Oh, right, okay," Newbie said. "Later, Dr Cox."

"See ya, Newbie," I said as I left the room. After stopping at the nurses' station to inform Carla of her extra job, I went directly to my office and relaxed back into my chair, propping my feet on the desk. Time for that cat-nap I'd promised myself.

"Uh, Dr Cox…"

Without opening my eyes, I mumbled, "Sad Sack, unless this is a matter of life and death then I se _-he-heriously_  recommend you get your wimp ass self outta my office and lemme sleep." A split second later, I heard the door swinging closed and hastily retreating footsteps. Smiling in a wonderfully self-satisfied way, I slumped down in my chair and let myself drift off.

I woke to the sounds of the Star Wars Imperial March and groaned loudly. There was only one person who was programmed to that ringtone and if she was calling me then I was probably in for an earful. Hence the intimidating ringtone, so I could prepare myself against the disturbance in the Force that would occur. A sidelong glance at my clock showed that I'd only gotten about twenty minutes of sleep. Damn it _._ Bracing myself, I flipped open the phone. "What?"

"Daddy!"

After I got over the initial shock of hearing a young boy instead of a screeching harpy, I felt my frown melt almost instantly. "Hey there, Jackie Boy. What're you doin'?"

"Playin' with mommy's phone," Jack answered. "I pushed-ed the four and then it was ringin' and you were there." I took a moment to marvel that I had even merited a spot on Jordan's speed dial, let alone such a high one. Then I remembered it was probably so she could efficiently torment me from wherever she was with the push of a single button.

"Where is she? Does she know you have the phone?"

"No," Jack admitted and giggled. "She's with Jenny."

I laughed. "That's a good boy, Jack." On the other end of the line, I heard my four-year-old son break out in giggles again. I grinned broadly, revelling in this little moment of happiness I could find in my day. After all the chaos and stress I had been through in the past twenty-four hours, nothing could make me feel better than my son.

 _Oh God_. I felt my smile steal away at the thought of children. It had completely slipped my mind during all of this, but what about Newbie's son? That was certainly a bit of family that deserved to know, but how? After all, I had no numbers to get a hold of that oh-so-charming charlatan of a woman that had reproduced with Newbie.

"Jack! What're you doing with my phone?" The shrill yell from the phone jerked me back into the moment and I heard Jack squeal and the thump of the phone hitting the ground. A second later was rustling and then I heard Jordan say, "Hello, who is this?"

"Don't worry, Jordaroo, it's just me," I said, rolling my eyes.

Jordan sighed heavily. "Oh thank God, I was afraid he called someone important," she said. Despite the obvious insults, I almost smiled again. Familiarity was comforting and it felt nice to hear that typical snarky Jordan response that was demeaning and so – touching.  _Wow, we have a screwed up sense of affection._  "So, are you coming home anytime soon? The kids are driving me nuts and I could use a hand."

"I'll see what I can manage," I said noncommittally. "I have a patient I really need to keep an eye on."

"Ooh, supermodel?" Jordan asked with feigned enthusiasm.

"Do you honestly think I'd still be on the phone with you if so?" I asked in return. There was a knock on the door and I looked up just as it was pushed open and Barbie poked her head in. "Ugh, whaddya want?"

"Um, Carla said there was something you needed to talk to me about before I left," Barbie said hesitantly.

I growled and rolled my eyes.  _Thanks, Carla, turf her off to me._  "Fine, whatever, come in," I barked, pointing at the chair. "And be quiet for a second, can ya? I'm on an important phone call." Barbie sat down obediently and pressed her lips tightly together.

"Flattery is not going to get you anywhere, Per-Bear," Jordan cooed into the phone. "Alright, I'll let you go 'cause I think Jack just ran into the coffee table again and it sounds like your next client is there. Don't ride her too hard, m'kay cowboy?"

I growled again without much conviction. " _Oooh hoo hoo_ , I hate you," I said, shaking my head and fighting a laugh.

Jordan laughed. "I know, honey, I hate you too," she responded and then the line went dead. I bit back my smile and tossed the phone onto the desk again.

"'I hate you' is an important phone call?" Blondie asked sceptically before her face suddenly split into a grin. "Oh, it was Jordan, wasn't it? You guys have like the cooky-est relationship but I think it's kinda sweet. And totally hot. It's like this one fantasy I have where I'm the young–"

"No, nah-no, no, no, nah-no. No. Nah-no, no," I said loudly, effectively silencing her for a second. "Did I say you could open that yapper yet? No, didn't think so. And for losing the silent game, well, there's just not gonna be any pretty gold stars for you now." I paused just long enough for Barbie to open her mouth and then rallied on. "And ya know, as much as you'd like to think that it would be flattering for me to be the inspiration for one of your twisted sex games, I just can  _nawt_  feel any satisfaction in knowing that. Because honestly, well, it's just a bit, ya know,  _cah-reepy_. Do ya get where I'm goin' with this?"

Barbie huffed. "Frick, just shut up and tell me what you wanted," she demanded and then blew away the bangs that had fallen into her face from her outburst.

I faked an over-dramatic gasp. "You went to that backbone specialist I told you about, didn't you?" I asked. Private Practice Barbie simply rolled her eyes and stared at me expectantly. "Alright, now there are some conditions in my telling you this, m'kay? First off, if your voice e- _he-heven_  comes  _close_  to reaching that pitch that breaks glass, I  _am_  going to have to club you to death with this stapler." I held up the stapler to emphasise this, mimicking the trashy models they used on game shows to make the prizes seem cooler, then promptly dropped it in favour of continuing with my point. "And you will  _nawt_  interrupt me while I'm talking. Which includes scampering out of here before I finish. Understood?"

"Yeah, sure, whatever."

"Good." I paused, steadying myself to repeat the fact I had been forced to recount far too many times today. My hands came up to rest on the desk in case Barbie broke the first rule and I had to hurriedly cover my ears before permanent damage was caused. "Newbie was in a car accident last night." Barbie let out a choked gasp but thankfully it seemed for the moment she was stunned beyond words. I took the opportunity and barrelled on with the rest of the story as quickly and concisely as I could. Sorta like the band-aid trick.

Barbie let out a slightly louder and higher gasp that still sounded like someone was crushing her oesophagus. I tried to ignore the urge to be said person if she made that noise again. "We're going to try and do everything we can to help him but we can't push him or it'll make it worse," I continued. "So if you have any family and friend photos hanging around your place that you can bring for him, or if you have anything that he was attached enough to that might trigger some memories, you can go ahead and bring it in for him when you come in tomorrow. But remember, try not to overwhelm him."

"Oh God." It once again sounded like she was being suffocated and I was glad I'd finished talking before she chose to find her voice or I would've had to find where I'd dropped that stapler and throw it at her. "What room is he in?"

"ICU two-oh-four," I answered as calmly as I could. "Be easy on him, okay? Remember, he's pretty damn confused at the moment. Maybe best to just stick to introducing yourself as friends and  _nawt_  include how many times you've had pasty, nerdy sex and all the self-sabotaged relationships and such." Barbie was still too shocked by the news to bother responding to the jab, simply giving me a short nod. She stood up to walk out but then I remembered something. "Oh, and Barbs," I said and she stopped. "One more thing before you retreat into your favourite crying closet. You know that mother of Newbie's spawn? You wouldn't happen to have her number, would ya? I think she should probably be told what happened since she's raising his child and all, but I don't have a number for her and Forgetful Lucy doesn't even know he's  _got_  a kid, let alone the phone number to reach them."

"Oh, right." She flipped open her phone, scanned through the numbers and then quickly scrawled it on the corner of a discarded post-it. Handing it to me, she added, "Oh, and her name is Kim Briggs, by the way."

"I'm well aware of that,  _sweetheart_ , but thanks for trying," I said sarcastically, accepting the paper. "Now get out."

I waited until Barbie had left my office before looking down at the numbers and frowning. I really hated this part of the job, but especially now that it was with people I actually  _knew_. Finally, I let out a grumble and grabbed the office phone, punching in the numbers with a bit more force than was probably necessary. The dial tone rang four times before there was a loud click and it went to an automated voice-mail message.  _Phew, dodged that bullet._

After the piercing beep, ( _Honestly, why did they have to make that so shrill? Were they trying to deafen all the idiots who tried to leave messages?_ ,) I cleared my throat. "Hey, Dr Briggs, this is Dr Cox," I said, feeling incredibly lame in doing so. "I'm calling because last night Newb – JD – was in a car accident. He is stable and recovering well, except for a bit of retrograde amnesia. I just thought you ought to know since you've got a kid together and all."  _Oh, that's good tact. Way to go, Mr Smooth._  "Anyway, if you have any questions at all just go ahead and give me a call and I'll do what I can." And then, for some inexplicable reason, I recited my personal number before saying a quick 'Bye' and hanging up.

"Oh God, what did I just do?" I said aloud to the empty office. I wasn't fond of Kim, not in the slightest. I hadn't really been bothered with her in the beginning, except of course for the obvious fact that she was a scalpel jock and her terrible, lightning-speed voice rivalled Barbie's, (although a later discovery that she had a love of Hugh Jackman made me nearly brain her with a bedpan,) but after everyone found out what she had done to Newbie, no one had really been too pleased with her. It was cold, even by Coxian standards. Coxian as in the adjective, not that weird team name combo Newbie came up with.

And the fact that it had been Newbie who had gotten screwed over by her – well actually that had nothing to do with it.  _Yeah, keep telling yourself that, Per._  I really needed to find myself a new conscience, this one was getting irritating.

Knowing there was no way in hell I was going to get back to sleep, I snatched my mobile off the table and tucked it into my coat pocket just in case Kim called back and headed back out of the office. I ignored the intern trying to ask me a question as I passed and made my way down to the ICU nurses' station. Thankfully, the very person I wanted to talk to was still standing there.

"How's he doing?" I asked.

Carla didn't even have to ask to know who I meant. "He seems to be doing alright," she said. "He still acts just like his usual self, only he keeps forgetting names and he doesn't get any of the inside jokes I keep dropping by accident." She shrugged and continued rearranging the folders she was working on. The nurses' ability to multi-task had always impressed me. "He was starting to hurt so I upped his morphine drip a bit."

"Blondie in with him now?"

"Yeah, I think so," she said. "Don't worry, I'll keep an eye on them and make sure she doesn't do anything stupid. Go home and get some sleep, I'll watch him."

"I can't leave," I said but before I could elaborate my phone rang with that same familiar ringtone. I turned away from the counter and answered. "What now?"

"Per, could you pick up some dinner on the way home?" Jordan asked. "Jen's being fussy and I don't wanna cook."

"I'm not coming home tonight," I said flatly.

I heard Jordan give a strangled noise of annoyance. "What do you mean you're not coming? I've been here with the kids for the last forty-eight hours. You were gone all night last night too. I think it's about time you come home."

"I can't," I said and suddenly there was an unexplained, and purely unwanted, emotion in my voice. Something like desperation and almost fear. Except obviously it wasn't, because those are definitely not emotions that ever get me. "My patient, he's got an arrhythmia and he could go into cardiac arrest. I can't lose him."

The tense silence on the phone told me that Jordan had understood exactly what I hadn't wanted her to. "Per, this patient, he's not Ben."

My frown tightened and it took me a long while to get my voice steady enough to warrant talking again. "I know that," I said, although it came out sounding a bit like a dejected kid.  _Way to go, Per._

"Who is he?" Jordan asked forcefully. "Another old college buddy?"

"No, it's Newbie."

I heard Jordan's gasp so loudly that I almost had to move the phone away from my ear to protect my hearing. "DJ?" she said in shock. "What happened? Wait – no, never mind. Come home and you can tell me then."

"Jordan, I told you I can't," I said. "He's got that arrhythmia, he really does."

"Perry, that hospital is full of hundreds of people who are going to be taking caring of him. You know everyone there loves him for some weird reason. No one is going to let anything happen to him. So get your ass home."

"But I can–"

Jordan sighed loudly. "Yes, there's no one in the hospital who can take care of him as well as you," she said with faked ardour. "We all know you're the greatest doctor in the world. But even you need to sleep and spend some time with your family. Jack misses you. Ever since he called he's been asking me when you're getting home. So you're coming home."

The mention of my son stirred something in me and I finally conceded. Besides, under Jordan's cynicism, I could detect the genuine concern. After all, I reasoned with myself, nothing made me feel better faster than being with Jack and Jennifer. Maybe a few hours sleep at home wouldn't hurt. "What do you want for dinner?"

"I'll call for a pizza." Then she hung up without another word. I smiled, recognising the change in plans as my ex-wife's version of a gesture of compassion.

Carla was watching me, that sweet, maternal smile on her face when I turned back to her. "I'll see you in the morning," she said and patted my hand. "I'm working the night shift tonight. If anything happens I'll give you a call." I gave a curt nod but I knew that Carla understood the silent thanks. She gave my hand a reassuring squeeze and then I stalked away with my hands tucked deeply into my coat pockets.

Outside Newbie's room, I slowed my gait just slightly and peered in the window. Newbie was reclining in the bed, listening to Barbie, who was perched on the foot of the bed and telling an animated story. There was a vague smile on his face but he looked like he would be fast asleep if it weren't for Barbie's persistent gabbing. Newbie's eyes shifted to glance over her shoulder and when he saw me there was no mistaking the unspoken plea there.

Deciding to be generous, only because my dislike of Barbie was slightly greater than my dislike of Newbie, I crossed the hall and poked my head in the door, letting out a short whistle. Barbie leapt up off the bed with a squeak of " _Frick_ " and then desperately tried to regain her composure. "Alright, Barbie, gossip fest is over. Out. It's Jennifer's bedtime." I inwardly grimaced at the realisation that I'd just called Newbie by the name of my daughter, who shared his acronym of a nickname. I made a quick mental note to never call him that again.

"Oh, right, sorry," Blondie said. She bent to give Newbie an awkward hug since he didn't seem capable of lifting himself out of the pillows and a brief peck on the cheek. "G'night, JD," she said as she scurried out of the room, skirting me.

Once the private practitioner had vanished down the hall, Newbie grinned almost teasingly at me. "Wow, you strike fear into the hearts of everyone, don't you?" he asked.

"Yeah, pretty much," I agreed with a shrug, not bothering to deny it. "Well, except Carla. No one messes with Carla. Now Barbie on the other hand, well I can scare her without trying. Besides, I figured with that extra morphine you'd want a bit of a nap and I know just how  _anti_ -relaxing her voice can be."

Newbie's smile shifted into a look of obvious gratitude and he said, "Thanks for that."

"No problem, Tammy. Get some sleep, and we'll see ya tomorrow." I gave the kid a small smile and then flipped off the lights. The hum of the hospital bed being reclined followed me as I stepped out of the room, and just as I was closing the door I caught the sleepy, "Night, Dr Cox."

I reluctantly felt myself smiling. "Night, Kathy."


	8. His Support System

_An essential piece of surviving as a doctor is learning to just toughen up and deal with all the shit that comes your way. However, another good thing to have with you is a support system, be it trusted co-workers, sympathetic friends, or even just your crazy ass family. Or a really good shrink, those are good too. You've just got to know that when things get out of control you've got someone who will be behind you, defend you, encourage you, and keep you from hitting the dirt. Or at least from having to sit in it too long._

The reality of it all threatened to strike me once again as I walked out of the doors to Sacred Heart. As I headed for my cherished Porsche, my eyes unconsciously drifted to the parking space behind mine.  _My bumper buddy;_ ; I remembered the term with a mixture of annoyance and amusement. Last night I had watched that blue sissy car peal out of the car park like some sort of street racer. That car was gone, obliterated beyond repair, and the driver, my Newbie, was strung up inside the building I'd just left.

I threw myself down into the seat of my car, forcing myself to steady my heart rate again. No use getting all crazy about it now, there was nothing I could do to change it. Body once again under control, I turned the ignition and started the drive home, determinedly ignoring the feeling of guilt that washed over me as I left the lot knowing that, because of me, Newbie wouldn't leave for a long time yet. I had to keep focused or I'd end up in the hospital bed next to Newbie and then we'd both be in trouble.

I managed to maintain my composure throughout the drive and arrived at my apartment the same time as the pizza guy. The pock-faced teen seemed a bit alarmed as I gruffly took the cardboard boxes out of his arms and shoved a few crumpled bills into his hand before barking at him to go. The kid had just turned hesitantly to leave, clearly wondering if he'd been jacked, when I opened the door and stepped in with a quick, "I'm home." I then promptly shut the door in the spotted teen's face.

"Daddy!"

The familiar shout made me smile and I shifted the boxes into one arm so I could catch my running son in the other. Jack leapt into my open arm and settled himself comfortably against my hip. Arms now full, I peered into the living room to find Jordan sitting on the couch with Jennifer Dylan resting in her lap. My ex-wife smiled slightly and the little girl let out a happy noise somewhere between a giggle and squeal.

"Pewwy gots pizza!" Jack announced cheerfully, wiggling in my arms. He then launched into some sort of squirmy dance while chanting, "Pizza, Pewwy, pizza."

Smiling, I jerked my head toward the dining room and Jordan obligingly stood and settled Jennifer into her highchair while I put the boxes on the table and placed the still wriggling Jack in his own chair. I slipped into the kitchen and returned with a stack of paper plates and a jar of some sort of foul, creamed vegetable substance for Jen's dinner.

Dinner was easily the brightest and seemingly most natural event that ever took place at the Sullivan-Cox residence. Jordan chatted about their day while simultaneously reminding Jack to take smaller bites so he didn't get sick. I ate my own slice with one hand while I spoon-fed the veggie goop to my infant girl. When Jen puckered her lower lip out and refused to open her mouth again, eyes fixated on the greasy pizza in my other hand, I grudgingly placed a spoonful of the vegetable-like stuff in my mouth and smiled while I fought back the urge to gag. After this, Jennifer eased up and allowed me to feed her the rest of the baby food while I washed away the horrid taste in my mouth with four more slices of pizza and two beers. There was the occasional snide comment that passed between Jordan and I, although we refrained from saying anything truly demeaning to each other in front of the kids. Overall, despite being an unorthodox and dysfunctional family, we actually looked quite  _normal_.

I smiled contentedly as I surveyed the scene before me. It gave me a sense of pleasure that I couldn't really find anywhere else; to see my baby daughter with creamed asparagus and some other vegetable I'd never heard of all over her face while she grinned up at me, that look of adoration in her eyes unmistakable; to listen to Jack stumbling over his words while he explained something to me that I couldn't understand but assumed was significant to the child; and to meet the eyes of my ex-wife, that woman I so loved to hate, as she shook her head at the mess I'd made feeding our daughter and began gathering up the dirty plates for the garbage. I saw in her gaze an understanding and compassion for me that no one else on the planet could rival and was not all that bothered to discover that, with all of her cynicism and harsh words, I actually loved to hate just how much I loved her.

"Hey, Captain Blank-Stare, you mind running JD's bath and cleaning up that disaster you just made?" Jordan asked, jerking me out of my observations. Instead of bothering to find a snappish reply, and forcing myself to ignore the use of that planned nickname she proposed just to annoy me, I simply extracted Jennifer from the various buckles keeping her in place and carried her into the bathroom. Boy, I am being a pansy today.

Washing my daughter was a simple enough task, at least compared to some of the other chores of raising children. She fussed a lot less than Jack ever had and I managed to come out of the ordeal only marginally damp. Now fed and bathed, dressed in her pyjamas and wrapped in her delivering blanket, Jennifer was drifting off in my arms. Handing her off to Jordan, I was then given the task of getting Jack into the bath as well. This ended up being a forty minute endeavour that I left completely soaked. Changing into one of my favourite jerseys and a pair of sweats, I finally rejoined the family in the living room. Jordan was lounging on the couch, Jennifer cradled on her chest, and Jack was rummaging through the DVD cabinet.

"You're letting him watch a movie?" I asked with a raised eyebrow, glancing at the clock. It was already after seven, less than an hour before Jack's normal bedtime.

"Oh, don't be so neurotic," Jordan said in reply. Then lowering her voice she added, "He's just had an entire slice of pizza and a bath. Add his favourite movie and he'll be out like a light in twenty minutes tops."

I smiled. "Fantastic," I said under my breath and then looked over at Jack, who was jumping up and down, hugging a movie case. "You picked one there, Jacko?"

"Kitty kitty!" Jack cried gleefully, dancing in a small circle. I inwardly sighed. Damn Newbie for giving Jack that movie for his last birthday. The last thing I needed was the ultimate girly-man rubbing off some of his behaviours on my child and getting Jack hooked on  _The Lion King_  had certainly qualified there. Not to mention that I had now seen it so many times that when Newbie began humming one of the songs at work, I knew the song and ended up with it stuck in my head the rest of the day.

"Alright, kitties it is," I conceded. I caught the amused look on Jordan's face as I stood to put the disc in the player. I ignored her again. When I had settled myself onto the couch again, Jack climbed up into my lap and made himself comfortable for the movie. And, just as Jordan had predicted, he was asleep before the baby lion had the chance to grow up.

Once we were certain both children were fast asleep, I turned off the television and carried the sleeping Jack into his bedroom. I arranged him on his bed, tucking him in underneath the heap of blankets. For a few seconds, I just stood there and stared down at my kid, a slightly dazed smile on my face. These were those minutes where I felt that life truly was good, seeing my son so peaceful. I had never been that at ease as a kid. It was reassuring for me to know that I had succeeded at least a little where my father had so miserably failed. I hadn't become my father. I was better.

"Per." I glanced back over my shoulder to see Jordan standing in the doorway, gesturing for me to follow her out. As I stepped towards her, she whispered, "You're getting all soft and mushy again."

I grabbed her ass and said, "Hmm, seems like you are to." A swift elbow into my stomach ended the conversation and I turned to close the door to Jack's room. Jordan's arms were empty so she'd obviously put Jennifer to sleep already but there was a plastic baby monitor clamped in one of her hands that was emitting a faint sound of breathing. I walked past her and into the living room, heading straight for my liquor cabinet and pouring myself a glass of scotch. I didn't bother asking Jordan if she was coming as well, knowing she would, and poured a glass for her as well. Just as I suspected, when I turned around she was already seated on the couch. Sliding over the back, I handed one of the glasses to her.

"How's DJ?"

I paused, my glass just a fraction of an inch from my lips. Leave it to Jordan to not beat around the bush. Willing movement back into my hand, I took a hasty sip of the amber liquid to steal myself.

"He's doing fine by medical standards," I said evasively, knowing that she would pick up on the dodge. "His leg is set back right, none of the cuts are infected. Those broken ribs will take a while to heal but they should be okay too. He'll have a heart attack if we tell him they had to shave off some of his hair to stitch his head shut, though." I gave a half-forced laugh at this, privately amused by the idea but too sobered by the seriousness of the condition to really feel any humour.

"Wow, what happened to him? Was he trying to prove to his son he could be a man but underestimated the little cub scout? Or did his new boyfriend turn out to be a jerk?" Jordan asked. I grinned as I looked her over, knowing this was part of the reason I loved her so much. She was acting sarcastic as usual but I could see that there was a sincere concern beneath her gaze.  _Deep_  beneath it. However, the tone of her voice made it easier for me to continue with such a serious topic and not worry about getting, well, Newbie-ish.

"Got mashed up in that wimp car of his," I said. "Some idiot trucker fell asleep and decided to use Lindsey's car as a rumble strip. Figures as much,  _he_  managed to escape with just a few stitches in his forehead and Newbie is stuck in the ICU after almost dying."

"Figures," Jordan agreed, shaking her head. "So that's why you didn't come home last night."

"No, Jordan, I didn't come home because I was on-call," I explained as if I was talking to Jack. "You know, that part of the job where I have to sleep at the hospital in case anyone decides to, you know,  _die_  in the middle of the night."

"Oh please, Per, we both know that you don't actually have to be on-call if you don't want to. That's why you're the boss," she said off-handedly. "So you don't have to live at the hospital or even deal with all those sick people. Look at Bob, he never treated patients."

"Please, please, puh- _lease_  tell me that you did  _nawt_  just compare me to Beelzebob," I said, glaring at her in the best attempt of anger I could pull off with her when I didn't actually hate her. It was hard to really be mad at her right now, though, since she was sitting here listening to me instead of blowing me off for the sleeping she clearly wanted right now. "C'mon, Jor, that's a low blow, even for you."

"Don't be so dramatic," Jordan said, rolling her eyes and taking a large swallow of the scotch. "I'm just saying, if you really wanted to come home last night then you would have. But you stayed because DJ got hurt and you were mother-henning him as usual." I opened my mouth to argue but she overrode me. "If not, then what was that on the phone earlier? That you couldn't leave because you were afraid of him going to cardiac arrest. We both know this is something more than you're letting on."

"He has an arrhythmia," I said, trying to inject all the confidence I had into it. At least it was true, even if it wasn't the most prominent factor. They could have fixed even that easily but the kid was allergic to the anti-arrhythmia medication. "I really was worried about cardiac arrest. You know how weak his little tween queen heart is."

"This isn't about DJ," Jordan said firmly. "This is about you." This statement struck me silent. "It was the cardiac arrest that took Ben, and you felt guilty because you left and you think you could have saved him if you were there. Ben was your best friend, I know that. And now DJ, who has always been there for you since he started working here, is the one in the hospital. So you're convinced if you leave then history is just going to repeat itself."

I drained my glass, silent for a moment because she had struck the nail on the head even though I was not about to admit it. Easiest scapegoat: topic detour. "Whoa there now, were you just insinuating that Caroline is comparable to my best friend? Because that is so far from the truth that I cannot even begin to figure where you started with that Thought-Train to arrive by noon at Never-Gonna-Happen Station."

"I didn't say that he was your best friend," Jordan clarified, her tone clearly annoyed by my edging of the topic. "However, we both know that you care for DJ just as much as you ever cared for Ben. It might be in a different way, because Ben was like your brother and DJ is more like your dog, but either way, you know you are really attached to them both."

"But Ben's dead," I said sharply, starting to get uncomfortable with the truth I wasn't ready to admit aloud yet. Or ever.

"Which is why losing DJ is that much more frightening for you," Jordan reasoned. "Because you've already lost Ben even though you cared for him so much. Now the thought of losing the other person who is that close to you is unbearable because then you're afraid you'd have nobody."

"It doesn't matter, he's already gone!" I exploded and then glanced worriedly at Jack's door, afraid my outburst had woken the boy. We both waited a few pregnant seconds but the door stayed shut.

"What do you mean?" Jordan asked and there was a look of genuine worry on her face now, all pretences gone. "He isn't-?"

"No, he's alive," I said, sinking back onto the couch dejectedly. "But he's a blank slate. The head injury gave him amnesia and he doesn't remember who anyone is, not even me. Not even himself. It's like he's already gone because the person I've known all this time is just – not there."

There was a very long quiet following this announcement as both of us mulled over the words. Finally, when three whole minutes had passed, Jordan swallowed the rest of her drink and offered a stunned, "Wow." I nodded, still too deep in thought to bother coming up with a response. Jordan seemed to think for a moment. "But amnesia's not always permanent. It could come back to him, can't it?"

"It's about a fifty-fifty chance," I grunted. "He says it feels like everything is there, it's just out of reach and too 'fuzzy' to see. We're trying to see if we can help him get a grasp on something. You know, bringing in pictures to see if something triggers."

"I hope it works," Jordan said solemnly. Then her sardonic smile was back. "It won't be any fun teasing him if he doesn't get it."

"Yeah, don't I know it," I said and managed a small laugh. For a little while longer, we sat in a thoughtful but easier quiet. Jordan broke it again by standing up.

"Alright, well. I'm going to bed," she declared. "It looks like you probably should too. You're gonna start looking as old as you really are if you don't sleep a little more."

I scoffed. "Never. Of course, with all that poison you've injected into your face, you're probably never going to look your age until it all collapses and you start looking like your mother."

"Don't start that," Jordan warned, her hands flying up to latch onto the sides of my face, her remarkably strong arms holding me in place. She was now close enough that I could feel her breath on my jaw as we stared each other down.

"Oh, and then when your boobs start sagging down you'll look like your grandmother instead," I said, grinning in a mocking way, daring her to stop me. Her eyes were flashing. "Of course, then you'll have to–" Before I could finish my sentence, my lips were being crushed beneath hers and I couldn't be bothered to conjure another word. She began nipping at my lower lip and, as much as I wanted to protest, I instead moaned in pleasure. The next thing I knew Jordan's legs were around my waist and we were heading for the bedroom. Our only stop on the way was to grab the baby monitor from the coffee table – just in case.

I carried her while she bit at my lips and jawline, trying to sneak in a kiss or two but finding it a little hard to focus. My hand fumbled with the door as I kept her aloft with one hand, my fingers constantly missing the orb as my eyes closed in pleasure each time Jordan assaulted me. I finally managed to open the door and stumbled inside, closing the door again with my foot. A split second later, I fell onto the bed, Jordan's legs still secured around my waist as I pinned her to the mattress.

Jordan bit at my neck roughly and I let out a noise of surprise, pushing up from her and glaring. "Hey, watch it, Count Dracula," I warned. Jordan ignored me with a quick mutter of, "such a baby," shoving me up into a sitting position and jerking my shirt off. Her fingernails ran over my chest forcefully and I tried desperately not to moan again. "Down, kitty," I growled while my fingers fumbled over the buttons of her shirt. To my surprise, Jordan's hand did indeed drift downward to the drawstring of my sweats and, just at that second, a wail emitted from the piece of plastic machinery that had been dropped unceremoniously on the floor just inside the bedroom door.

Jordan and I groaned in synch and the former threw herself off my lap, trudging out of the room. A few seconds later, I heard her voice join in with Jennifer's on the baby monitor. Sighing, I spread myself out on the bed, tucking my hands behind my head and relaxing back on the pillows. Despite the rush of endorphins, there was no denying I was knackered. It wouldn't hurt for me to just close my eyes for a second while I waited for Jordan to come back and attack me again. She'd wake me back up without a second thought if I fell asleep anyway.

The alarm woke me when it went off at six the following morning. I hastily rolled over and slammed a hand down on the contraption to silence it before it woke Jordan. I had fallen asleep before she'd gotten back from tending our daughter and she had surprisingly left me to sleep for once. Now she was curled up on the other side of the bed, a strand of her hair hanging limply over her face and fluttering under her nose while she breathed. It was an almost charming thing to watch her sleep; she was quiet and peaceful and it once again reminded me of that beautiful young girl I'd fallen in love with over twenty years ago. Of course, her face was so youthful because most of it was synthetic, but that was beside the point.

Dragging myself out of bed, I set about my morning routine: stumble to the kitchen in my boxers to start the coffee machine; grumble to myself that we really should invest in a coffee maker with an automatic timer, nearly break my ankle tripping on a stray toy as I make my way back to the bathroom; take a quick, scalding shower; dress in my usual work clothes; and then, finally, return to the kitchen to get that oh-so-necessary dosage of caffeine.

As I was starting on my second cup, Jack trudged into the kitchen, rubbing at his eyes. I smiled. Jack had always been an early riser just like me. "Hey, Jacko," I said and the boy grinned up at me.

"Hey," Jack said, his voice still thick with sleep. "Bref-ist?"

"Cereal good?" I asked back, already heading for the cupboard before I heard the "yum" of approval from behind. I poured a bowl of some sugary cereal and doused it in milk before setting it at the kitchen table in front of my son, handing him a spoon.

"You eat?" Jack asked, glancing over suspiciously at the blank spot on the table in front of me. I looked at the sugary sweet bowl and decided that, although I really should eat something before work, there was no way I was eating something that sweet this early in the morning. I retrieved an apple from the crisper and a small paring knife, and then sat down at the table to eat it. Jack looked content with this and began sloppily eating his own breakfast.

I watched Jack eat as I carved slices out of the piece of fruit and popped them into my mouth. Occasionally, Jack would look over and open his mouth expectantly, at which I would toss a piece of apple into the kid's mouth. Jack beamed at this as he munched the apple bits. As I stood to toss out the apple core, I glanced at my watch and frowned. Time to leave for work.

As much as I wanted to feel upset at this, and I did because I liked being with my son, I still felt a little anxious to be back and check on Newbie. Carla hadn't called, which meant that nothing had apparently happened, but that didn't ease my nerves a whole lot. I needed to see for myself. It was just how I worked.

"Alright, kiddo, I gotta go to work," I announced and Jack frowned in a way so reminiscent of his mother's pout that I almost laughed. "Sorry, bud, but I'll be home tonight and we'll watch another movie, m'kay?"

"Aw-wight," Jack said, the words embedded in a heavy sigh. "Fishy?"

"Fishy, it is," I agreed. Great,  _Finding Nemo_  again. "Okay, give me a kiss." I leant down for Jack to kiss me and then headed for the living room to gather my stuff from where I'd dropped it the night before. Next to my car keys, I found an old shoebox with a piece of scrap paper taped to the top. I recognised the handwriting as Jordan's.

_Had these in the closet, thought maybe they would help DJ._

I lifted the lid of the box and felt something in my chest lurch; it was filled with a collection of black-and-white polaroids, all of them featuring people who looked very surprised to be captured on film. There were dozens of faces that I recognised from work, including my own quite a few times. The picture on the very top featured me, scowling impressively, and a stunned Newbie. I could remember when this had been taken, all those years ago. Ben's pictures from when he'd been in the hospital.

"Hey, Jackie Boy," I said and glanced back at my son, still sitting at the kitchen table and swinging his legs. Jack looked up intently. "You wanna do me a favour?" Jack nodded eagerly, all smiles. "You go tell your mum that I love her very much, okay?"

Jack nodded again and leapt out of the chair. I reached the front door at the same time that Jack ran down the hall and into my bedroom, yelling, "Moooom, Pewwy wuvs you vehr mush."

Grinning in amusement, I left the apartment, the taste of sugary cereal still on my lips from Jack and my ex-wife's box of photos tucked under my arm.


	9. His Head-to-Heads

_In a hospital, confrontation is just something you come to accept as an everyday thing, like your morning coffee or having to put on a brave face and deal with that patient you can't stand. But there are a couple different kinds of confrontation. First there are the friendly ones, where you bicker with a friend but there is no real animosity. Then there are the confrontations spurred solely by anger that usually end up being pointless fights used to release all that pent up frustration. And then, occasionally, you just get stuck in those confrontations where you can't really argue much as you're getting your ass handed to you on a silver platter. My typical day, unfortunately, consists of all three._

I was in a far better mood when I arrived at the hospital that morning than I had been the previous morning. Of course, the full seven hours of sleep and having real food in my stomach might have had just a little bit to do with that. Still, I slipped back into my usual demeanour as I entered the hospital, remembering what my job was and just how many bad things were happening at this very moment all over the building. I growled at a cheery intern who tried to say good morning to me, snarled an insult at that huge janitor that was always lurking around but never seemed to be really working (although I was careful not to say anything too harsh because I didn't want to spend the rest of the morning tied up in the morgue again), and gave a long-winded rant to the young resident that had hunted me down about a diagnosis.

"Wow, impressive," Carla remarked from behind the desk as the resident tried his hardest to not  _run_  away. "You must have gotten some sleep."

"I slept beautifully, despite the fact that I'm quite certain there was a monster lurking in the bed with me," I said, sparing her a genuine smile. Before I could even ask the next question, she was answering me.

"He's the same as yesterday," she said. "Still, doesn't remember anyone but he seems to be even cheerier after getting sleep. Kinda like you. Turk's in with him now, brought in some photo albums he found in Bambi's apartment last night."

"Oh, yippee," I said, feigning a teenage-girl-like enthusiasm. "Scrapbooks! We get to take a yippity-skippity trip down memory lane."

Carla arched an eyebrow at me, planting one fist on her hip. "And what, oh cynical one, do you have in that box?" she asked.

Deciding I didn't feel like explaining, especially not in front of the curious onlookers that were pretending not to listen to us, I simply held the box toward her and opened the lid. Carla's eyes widened, picking up on what they were immediately. "The She-Beast sent them for Newbie," I said, then closed it and tucked it under my arm again. "Her hormones are still out of whack from the last pregnancy."

"You sure she's not pregnant again?" Carla asked jokingly.

"Carla, don't scare me with that sort of voodoo, please," I said, shuddering dramatically. Carla laughed appreciatively. "Anyway, as much as I love gabbing with you, I've got about six weeks of paperwork to catch up on so I'm gonna go drop these off with Yvette and head to my office. You're welcome to drop by if you feel like it."

"Stop flirting, Dr Cox, that ship sailed forever ago. You know, after the anchovy thing," Carla said and she flashed me that charming, cheeky smile of hers before walking away into a patient's room. She paused in the doorframe, glanced at me over her shoulder, and gave her butt a little wiggle. Then she winked and vanished into the room. I simply watched her go, grinning. God, she is so great.

Turning on my heel, I strode down to Newbie's room. The door was wide open and the kid was sitting up in bed, Turk sitting in my chair – no, it didn't belong to me, it was the  _visitor's_  chair. The pair of them were pouring over the pages of an album, Turk pointing to different photos and explaining the situations, making Newbie laugh. It was actually kind of endearing to watch, finally seeing Newbie so happy again while his black wife entertained him. It was something normal.

"Morning, Glory, Gandhi," I said, causing the other two to look up.

To my surprise, Newbie giggled at this. When I raised an eyebrow, the kid murmured, "You said morning glory."

I rolled my eyes. "Why yes I did, and like said flower you are dainty, feminine, pretty in pink, and absolutely impossible to get rid of," I said. Gandhi shook his head disapprovingly but Newbie was grinning. "So, Turtle-Head, don't you have a job that I pay you to be doing? Which you're currently, well,  _nawt_  doing?

Gandhi glanced at his watch. "Not for about twenty more minutes I don't," he answered with a shrug. "My first surgery isn't until eight-thirty."

"And you're not out already doing your pre-op basketball game?" I asked in mock awe. "How will you ever de-stress enough that you don't cut off a patient's limb?"

"Ha, as a matter of fact, I'm amputating Mr Carlisle's foot," Gandhi said, grinning in that overly-cocky way and arching his eyebrows in a sign of knowing that he's won the argument. Newbie stifled a laugh. "Besides, I'm chillin' with JD."

"Reminiscing about the good ol' days, eh Golden Girls?" I asked, glancing again at the photo album that was spread out on Newbie's lap. Despite myself, my curiosity got the best of me and I crossed the room to stand behind Gandhi's chair, looking down at the page.

There were eight shiny photographs beneath the protective sheeting. All eight of them featured a range of people in tacky eighties' clothing involved in various activities, drinking or dancing or sprawling out in what appeared to be a messy dormitory. At the centre of all of them were the same two people, always right next to each other: a young black guy with a high-top fade and a scrawny white guy with an atrocious, black mullet.

"Oh. My. God." I stared down at the younger versions of the two men in front of me, eyes wide and trying not to break down in hysterical laughter. "You both looked  _ridiculous_."

"Hey, that hair was so fly," Gandhi said defensively. "It was getting me so much tail I didn't know what to do with myself."

"Yeah, if someone offered to have sex with you I can imagine that you would just be  _so-ho-ho_ clueless as to what you're supposed to do," I said with a sympathetic nod. "You're lucky you managed to brainwash Carla into marrying you and getting her to teach you a thing or two about, you know,  _the naughty_. Otherwise, you'd just be all kinds of lonely and pathetic." I stopped myself from adding, 'Like Newbie here,' at the last second, forgetting the kid had no idea his social life was so tragic.

Gandhi had just opened his mouth to respond hotly when a young, blonde nurse poked her head in the door. "Dr Cox?"

"What?" I snapped, glowering at her. "And it better be  _su-hu-huper_  important."

"Um, admissions just called up, they said there's a woman down there who's freaking out pretty bad and she's asking for you. Her name was Kim-something."

I felt my frown tighten and when I glanced down, I found Gandhi look up at me, both horrified and anxious. Newbie, on the other hand, just looked curious. "Alright, because dealing with a psychotic, screaming woman who is looking to me for answers is what I do every Wednesday," I said derisively, pushing my usual expression back into place and rolling my eyes. "Honestly, if I had wanted to deal with a crazy woman I'd have just stayed home."

Then I tossed the shoebox onto the bedside table beside two more, large photo albums and stormed out of the room, staring at the nurse so she scooted out of my way. While I acted like as much of a jackass as normal, I was deep in thought as I made my way back down to the lobby. Great, Kim was here. I had expected her to call me back, not fly over here on the broomstick she'd stolen from Jordan and go all hysterical.

When I stepped out of the elevator on the first floor, I could already hear a high-pitched voice alarmingly similar to Barbie's, as well as the frantic and hushed voice of the nurse that was trying to calm her down. The moment I stepped into her range of vision, Kim's eyes locked on me and she completely forgot about the nurse in her rush. "What happened?" she said instantly, breathless from already having assailed the nurses for information they didn't know.

"Calm down," I said firmly, staring her down. "When you stop freaking out then I'll explain everything. Got it?"

Kim scowled at me, folding her arms over her chest and pointedly taking a deep breath in and out. "Alright, talk," she said flatly.

I felt my annoyance multiplying at the fact that she was trying to give me orders. I didn't like her to begin with and this was most certainly not helping her case. I tried to keep reminding myself that she was the family of a patient and therefore needed to be treated with a certain level of respect, but the voice in the back of my mind kept reminding me that technically the only blood she shared with Newbie was flowing through their kid. The kid that she had lied to him about and tried to keep a secret from him. So technically, I really owed her nothing.

Biting the inside of my cheek, I jerked my head, gesturing for her to follow me to the corner of the room. When we had stepped off to the side, I planted myself firmly, legs apart and arms folded, touching my nose with my thumb before starting. "Be quiet and listen," I said bluntly. "I'm only telling you about all this because I figure since you're currently in possession of Newbie's kid then you have some sort of legal right to know, because I honestly do  _nawt_  like you and, if I had my way, you would  _ne-he-hever_  set foot in my hospital again."

"Yeah, I know, I've heard it before," Kim said, shrugging it off.

"Good, glad that's understood." My jaw clenched and I rolled my neck and shoulders a bit to ease myself up. Then I launched myself into a full and detailed explanation of exactly every injury the kid had sustained, comfortably using all of the medical terms I was used to because I knew that she would be able to follow without me dumbing it down. She might be a horrible cow, but she was also a doctor and she knew the lingo. By the time I finished telling her about the amnesia circumstances, Kim looked genuinely terrified.

"Oh God," she breathed, her hands over her mouth. "But he's – he's going to come back, isn't he? I mean his memory will come back, won't it?"

"I honestly don't know," I admitted. "We're doing what we can but for now, all we can do is wait it out and see if anything changes."

Kim looked like she might actually be on the verge of tears as she shook her head slowly. "But what about Sam? JD won't remember him? How can I explain that to Sammy? I can't handle raising him on my own!"

I stared at her, completely disbelieving. I had just told her that Newbie had nearly died and when she started panicking, it sounded like she was truly concerned about the father of her child, but in the end, she managed to make it come back to her. I had seen a lot of people react selfishly to bad news but this one really drove it home. And I fully intended to tell her that. "That has got to be the most selfish thing I have ever heard in my life," I said, deadpan, and this stopped Kim short. "JD almost died two nights ago. He is stuck up there with absolutely no idea that he has a son, or who his best friends are, or even who he is. And I can understand you being worried for Sam but by God, you instantly start thinking about yourself."

"Well I'm sorry if I'm a little anxious about the idea of suddenly having to raise my child without the help of his father!" Kim shot back, her panic replaced by rage instantly. "If JD's memories never come back then this honestly will never be his problem because he won't remember having a commitment to his son, but I'm the one who will be stuck taking care of Sam alone. And even though he's too young to know it now, what'll happen in the future when Sam starts asking where his daddy is? How do I tell him that his daddy loved him very much but now he can't remember who he is?"

"Do you honestly think that JD would flake out on Sam, memory or not?" I snapped heatedly. I was aware that there were people staring at us but I didn't care. I was sort of used to being stared at when I was angry anyway. "Even if he can't remember it, if you tell JD that Sam is his son then I can guarantee you that he is going to do everything in his power to help out. He will give everything to make sure that kid grows up happy because that's just who he is. He would do anything to please people and he will sure as hell do that for his son whether he remembers being there when he was born or not. JD has a heart of gold and I know the sight of that little boy is gonna melt him like the girly little popsicle he is." I continued before thinking about what I was saying, so caught up in my rage. "Besides, maybe forgetting would be for the best. Then he'll forget about all the ways you've lied to him from square one, especially that  _little_  kicker about having miscarried when you  _really_  didn't and then, when he found you out, you came begging for his help. Might make your relationship a bit less awkward, don'cha think?"

Kim looked as though she had been physically struck by my words and her eyes grew misty. However, she straightened her posture and sucked it up. "Fair enough," she said, her voice thick but under control. There was a resounding silence in which I felt a bit of guilt creeping into me at the sight of the emotionally crushed woman. As much as I hated her, I knew that my blow had been way below the belt and I didn't really enjoy fighting dirty unless it was absolu _-hu-hutely_ necessary. I tried to reason with myself that this time had been one of those cases; how else would I get Kim to really listen?

"Can I talk to him?"

The perfectly composed question startled me and I focused on Kim's face. She had gathered herself in those seconds and although her eyes were still emotional, the rest of her was neutral. "I don't know if there's any way I can stop you without some sort of legal ramifications," I admitted, my way of giving her permission. "Naturally, I wouldn't care except this hospital's lawyer is worthless and I don't want to lose everything."

"Hey!" I glanced sideways and saw Ted standing just a few feet away and watching us argue. Rolling my eyes, I whistled sharply and jerked my thumb in the direction of the hall. Ted trudged away with a lengthy, "Awwwhhh, man."

When I returned my attention to the conversation, Kim shifted awkwardly and then tentatively ventured, "Do you think I should bring Sam in to see him?"

This unsettled me even more than the first question had. How could I possibly answer that question? My first instinct was to protect Newbie and I didn't want to overwhelm the kid by throwing in the pressure of his child. The last thing we needed was to send Newbie into a complete mental breakdown. That surely wouldn't help matters. However, at the same time, how could I tell someone that they couldn't bring a patient's own child in to see them? I was sure there was some sort of legal mess to deal with on that front. And besides, maybe seeing Sam would trigger Newbie's brain. I knew that if there was one thing in the world that I would refuse to forget, it would be my son. Maybe it was the same for Newbie.

"You'll have to talk to him first," I said simply, shrugging. "When you talk to him and explain the situation to him, then you can ask him if he wants to deal with that or not. But in the end, I think that's your call, really."

"Oh," Kim said and there was a sudden uneasiness in her voice. "Well, I'm not quite sure I'm ready to talk to him just now. Maybe – maybe I'll come back tomorrow?"

"Fair enough." Then I turned and walked away from her abruptly, heading back up to my office. After getting there, I remembered leaving the box of pictures in Newbie's room and decided I should probably go back and explain what they were. The moment I set foot in the ICU, Carla appeared in front of me as if by magic.

"What the hell?" she demanded. Her body was swiftly assuming the 'angry Latina woman from the block that is gonna kick your ass' position and I prepared myself for what I knew was coming even if I wasn't quite sure  _why_  it was.

"What'd I do?" I asked, trying to assume alpha-male mode, but she still seemed to overpower me with her stare alone.

"What were you thinking, screaming at Kim like that? She was trying to get things sorted and get some sort of order into her life and you just exploded at her. What is wrong with you? I mean I understand that you don't like her, I don't much either, but that doesn't mean that you have to go completely ballistic on her when she is so emotionally unstable. God, Perry, do you ever think before you talk? I could just–" Carla mimed a very violent action that looked like it included both a throttling and clawing my chest open, before letting out a loud growl of frustration that made me too proud of her to fear for my life for a second. But only a second.

Carla slipped back into her native tongue and continued to give me the tongue lashing of a lifetime, using far more colourful language now that a lot less people could understand what she was saying to me. And I accepted it all silently, wondering how she'd found out so fast but knowing deep down that I deserved every bit of it – well, okay, so maybe not that chest-clawing-strangulation part.


	10. His 'Awwwkwarrrd' Pauses

_Being a doctor means having to answer a lot of questions that you might not be prepared for. Why couldn't you save them? Why won't my child be coming home? How is this fair? Sometimes if you're lucky you can come up with a suitable answer off the top of your head. But most of the time, you get stuck in that little awkward hesitation while they expect an answer and you search your brain for what you can possibly say to make the situation better when you know deep down that no words can make it right again._

It was a full five minutes later when Carla was finally done berating me and I stood awkwardly, letting her have her angry storm off. Everyone else still in the room was staring at me but the moment I scowled, they all hastily turned away and the noise level in the ICU rose as they returned to work. I let out a small growl. Everyone enjoyed watching Jackass Cox get his ass handed to him. Tucking my hands deep into my pockets to shoulder the guilt that Carla had oh-so-successfully thrown on me, I made my way to Newbie's room.

Gandhi had left and the photo album was back on the table with the others. Instead, Newbie had the shoebox in his lap and he was rummaging through the photos curiously, glancing at each of the ones he pulled out with a look of intense focus. I leant against the door frame, my arms crossed over my chest, and cleared my throat quietly.

Newbie squeaked ( _can he get any more feminine?_ ) and dropped the pictures he was holding. "Oh, Dr Cox, I'm sorry. I shouldn't have gotten into your stuff, I was just curious, and I'm really sorry, and–"

I laughed, cutting over the rambling apology. "Relax, kid, Jordan asked me to bring those in for you. I wouldn't have left it here if it was something private."

"Oh, okay, sorry," Newbie said, grinning sheepishly. "But who – who's Jordan?"

"My ex-wife," I explained and was amused by the look of sheer confusion on Newbie's face. I watched the kid's eyes travel to the gold band I still wore on my left hand. "Keeps the ladies off me," I said to the unspoken question. Okay, so not  _exactly_  true but believable enough coming from me.

"And your ex-wife knows me and is close enough that she sends me pictures to help me get better?" Newbie asked uncertainly.

"Yeah, surprised me too," I admitted. I came in and sat heavily in the chair beside the bed. "She's normally not, you know,  _nice_  to anyone. But I guess she figured she could help so I'd quit spending so much time at the hospital and actually go home and help with the kids."

"Wait, so you live with your ex and your kids? Together?"

I chuckled again, lacing my hands together behind my head and leaning back in the chair. "We're complicated," I finally confessed with a small grin.

We sat in silence for a moment until, finally, Newbie seemed to realise that I was not going to elaborate. He picked up the photographs he'd dropped across his lap and raised an eyebrow. "Got the time to fill me in?" he asked, lifting the pictures questioningly. "I have all these pictures but there's no names or dates or anything on 'em."

I grunted, scooting the chair a bit closer to the bed so I could see. "Okay, Juliet, what do you wanna know?" I asked, pretending to be reluctant. I knew the kid was really only doing it for the company because all the pictures that were currently in his hands featured people he'd already met, namely the two of us.

"Who took these?" Newbie asked with a wide grin. "They're great. They're all so random, it's like no one knew they were being photographed. Are these all candid camera shots?"

I smiled appreciatively but fought back a wave of the closest to sadness that I am capable of coming as I thought about it. "His name was Ben," I started to explain slowly. It had been years and I had gotten over his death, but for some reason, this time it took a lot of focus to not let my voice get thick. Maybe it was because I had to tell it to Newbie, who had been so present in everything that had happened with Ben. "He was my best friend and my ex-wife's brother. He took these while he was a patient here a few years ago." I pulled the shoebox toward myself and rifled through the squares of photographic paper until I found the right one. "This is him."

It was probably one of the closest times Ben had come to taking a posed picture. He and I were standing in the lobby of the hospital on the day that Ben had arrived for Jack's first birthday and Ben had pressed his face in next to mine to take an impromptu photo op. Newbie was surveying it with a vague smile. "Looks like a fun guy," he said and there was no joke in his voice as he said it.

"He was," I said. I instantly saw the change in Newbie's expression. The kid's memories might not be there but he had enough sense to tell the difference between past and present tense. But I was done talking about Ben for today. "Find anyone else in that box you're curious about?"

Newbie cleared his throat and began flipping through the photos again. "Okay, what about this one?" he asked and held one toward me. I glanced at it and grinned.

"That would be Jordan," I answered, thoroughly amused by the bizarre expression on her face. She'd clearly been in the middle of ranting at her brother when the picture had been taken. "Looks charming there, doesn't she?"

"Yeah," Newbie said uncertainly.

I laughed. "It's okay, you can agree with me," I prompted. "I'm not going to go crazy on you for telling me my ex-wife looks weird. I tell her it on a daily basis." Newbie just laughed and plucked another photo from the box, showing it to me. My smile flickered. "That'd be Laverne, she was a nurse here since back when I was an intern," I said. "She was a real busy-body, knew e- _he-verything_ about e- _he-veryone_  in this hospital and was constantly spreading the gossip 'round to the other nurses. A real religious fanatic too; was always preaching to us about Jesus. Crazy woman." I gave a small chuckle. "She was a good woman, though, even if she was loony. Died in a car crash last year."

Newbie's smile was wistful. "She sounds like a nice lady. Wish I coulda met her." Then he seemed to pause and rethink his words. "Well, I mean, obviously I met her, but I mean I wish I could remember meeting her."

"You've met Carla, that's pretty damn close," I offered. "Carla doesn't tell me that Jesus is judging my every movement, but she's got that same gossipy, girl-from-the-block attitude. And ever since Laverne died, she's been doing a lot more of that believing in fate and 'all for a reason' junk. I swear to God, if I didn't know better I would think that Laverne was Carla's mother with how much alike they act. They were close. Laverne was sorta the one to show Carla the ropes when she started working here, really acted like a mother hen sometimes. I know Carla sorta started thinking about her as this substitute maternal figure, especially after her real mom died."

"You sure seem to know a lot. Did you take over as the hospital gossip centre?" Newbie asked with a teasing grin.

"Alexa, do I look like a gossip columnist?" I asked roughly, rolling my eyes. "For your information, I only know because Carla is a good friend of mine. We've worked together a long time, and her take-no-shit personality makes her one of the few people who can tolerate being around me for any length of time." Deciding that the topics were getting too personal, I pointed at the box. "Okay, next flash card."

We went on like this for almost an hour, Newbie drawing out a photograph with an unfamiliar face and me filling in the blanks as best I could. Carla popped her head in once and a while and occasionally stayed for a second to join in the stories but she always had to hurry away to get back to her job. I, on the other hand, was procrastinating on getting back to my own. One of the perks of being in charge.

I was in the middle of telling a story about one particular scene in which a very irate-looking Jordan was hurling herself towards poor Ben behind the camera. "She just threw herself at him, completely ready to rip him a new one," I said, leaning back in my seat and propping my feet on the edge of the bed. "I half expected her to shove that camera so far down his throat that I'd have to schedule him a surgery to get it removed and take the pressure off his spleen."

"You love her, don't you?"

The abrupt question left me stunned. I hated it when people could strike me speechless, it felt so uncomfortable to not being able to summon up a crazed rant to blow off anything that might become semi-personal or emotional. It took me a long time to string up something to say, deciding between going off on a ranting denial or just admitting the truth. "We tolerate each other," I said and shrugged. "It's sort of a mutual hatred, but because we're both twisted, emotionally-crippled people it just works out for us both."

"How – romantic," Newbie said with a laugh. Curiously, he began poking through the box again. "So you said you had kids?" I gave a shallow nod. "Got any pictures of them?"

I dug my wallet out of my pocket and slipped the piece of photographic paper from the plastic sleeve. It had been taken just a few weeks prior, showing the normally tornado-like Jack very carefully holding a smiling Jennifer like she was made of glass. "This is them," I said and offered the picture to Newbie. "That's Jack, he'll be five in a few months. And that's Jennifer Dylan, she's a year."

A bright smile slipped onto Newbie's face and I had to ask, "what you smilin' at there, Daisy," before getting anything outta the kid. "Jennifer Dylan," he said slowly. I knew instantly where this was going. "J.D. That's what everyone calls me, too. I knew we must have been close for me to remember you first but–"

"Don't go getting delusions of grandeur there, Scarlet, that's pure coincidence." _Damn you, Jordan._  For being a blank slate, the kid was sure perceptive. "I did  _nawt_ name my daughter after you." When I looked up at him again, Newbie was staring at the picture with an unreadable look, something hurt and sad and concerned all at once. I cursed myself, forgetting that I had to ease up on my rebuffing the kid in this state. Before I could apologise, Newbie spoke again.

"Do I have any kids?"

I froze in shock and my feet slipped off the bed with a heavy thump. I had not been prepared for this question, not in the slightest. This wasn't supposed to come up until after Kim showed up, she was going to deal with it. How in the name of all that was terrible was I supposed to tell Newbie that he, in fact, had a little infant child that he couldn't remember? The minutes stretched by while I fought with myself about just what to say.

Newbie shifted uncomfortably. "Okay this awkward silence is getting just a little bit unnerving," he said, staring at me with intense concentration. "Just tell me, I want to know."

I took a deep breath, readying myself to say the words. It alarmed me just how worried I was about doing this, about how Newbie would react and what I could do to console him or whatever he needed. I ne- _he-hever_  felt this concerned about people, except maybe my own kids and, on a rare occasion, Jordan. Steeling myself, I drew in the breath to answer.

"You do."

The breath rushed out of me in shock. Those were my words but they had not come out of my mouth. Both of our gazes switched to the door, where the blonde woman in a green turtleneck was standing. One of her arms was wrapped around her torso, hugging herself tightly, and the other arm hung at her side, carrying a blanket-covered child seat. She smiled at Newbie and then turned her eyes on me. "I changed my mind, I came back," she said. There was a hesitant pause before Kim added, "You were right."

"I know," I said but without the usual cynicism. Truth be told, I was amazed to see her standing there but I was glad she was. This conversation wasn't for me to have, this was for the parents to share. After all, I barely knew the little kid at all except for having seen him a few times when Newbie'd brought him to the hospital, and all I knew about him was that his first name was Sam.

Newbie looked between us with a mounting level of confusion on his face. "Um, what have I missed?"

"Sounds like you're missing quite a bit right now," Kim said, trying to sound light. She approached the bed slowly, much in the same way that Carla had at first, and leant against the side with the baby carrier still at her side. "You really don't remember me?"

Newbie was quiet, his face pulled into a look of focus as his curious blue eyes surveyed every detail of her face. "I want so badly to say yes," he said softly. His tone was nothing but sadness and desperation. "I have that same feeling like I should know, but it's not coming to me. I'm sorry."

"Oh, don't be sorry," Kim said and she placed one of her hands on his. "It's not your fault this happened." At this, I squirmed slightly in my seat. "And I'm sorry I didn't come up as soon as I found out. I just, I needed time to think things over and all."

Newbie nodded in understanding. I shook my head; Newbie was too forgiving. "So you – are you my wife or girlfriend or something?"

"I'm not that lucky," Kim said with an over-bright laugh. I made a noise of warning in my throat, to which Kim's only response was, "Oh butt out, Dr Cox." She turned back to Newbie. "Anyway, I'm neither. We dated for a while, off and on mostly, but things just never worked out between us. But we did have a kid together. A son."

"A son," Newbie repeated, sounding slightly dazed, and a fuzzy smile slipped onto his face. "I have a son."

"You want to see him?" His eyes lit up when Kim lifted the child carrier onto the foot of his bed and he struggled to sit up as she pulled away the blanket. I quickly stood and tucked an arm behind his back, helping to prop him up, while simultaneously pressing the button on the side of the bed to incline it. Newbie stared in open-mouthed wonder at the little boy who was blinking blearily, having been woken up by all the motion. Kim extricated the boy from the buckles and then set him carefully in Newbie's expectant arms. "JD, this is your son–"

"Sam," Newbie said gently, smiling at his son. Kim and I exchanged surprised looks. It took a few silent seconds before Newbie looked up, seeming to realise what he'd said. "Wait, that's his name, right? Sam?"

Kim was the first to recover and nodded. "Samuel Perry Gilligan Dorian," she answered. This startled me and I looked over at her, my brows pulling together.  _Perry?_

Before I could question them about the name, though, Newbie was beaming excitedly. "I remembered something," he said in awe. "My son. I remembered my son's name." He lifted the little boy to kiss his forehead and Sam let out a pleased squeal.

"Way to go, Newbie, about time you got something through that head of yours," I said. "Besides, you know, the rock that got you in this mess in the first place."

Newbie wasn't bothered by the comment, still grinning down at his little boy. Finally, he glanced up at me. "See, I can name my kid after you, why can't you admit you named yours after me?" he said jokingly. A flash of guilt shot through me and apparently it showed on my face because Newbie quickly muttered, "Sorry, was only kidding."

An uncomfortable silence fell over the room. I shifted anxiously, crossing my arms and pitching my weight from one foot to the other. Kim was toying with her hair, trying to act as though she wasn't watching for my reaction. And Newbie seemed to be caught between the son he couldn't seem to keep his eyes off of and the doctor who he was waiting for to break the silence. That was when I fell back onto the oldest trick in the doctor's handbook.

I faked a page.

Whipping it out dramatically, I pretended to read the blank screen. "Damn, patient's coding, gotta go," I said quickly. I shot a look at Kim. "Do not, I repeat na _-hawt_  overwhelm him." When she rolled her eyes, I gave Newbie a small nod and then left the room quickly.

Stopping by the CoffeeBucks only long enough to grab a large, black coffee and answer Bobbo's typical greeting with a 'blow it out your ass, Bob' I returned to my office and sat down behind the desk.  _Time to actually do my job now_ , I thought ruefully, pulling a stack of forms closer.

Two mind-numbing hours of paperwork later, I needed a change and headed out to the nurses' desk. I had taken it upon myself to cover a few of Newbie's patients, or two of them actually. Just the ones I already knew and had worked with a little. The rest I piled onto the residents and interns. The first had been Mrs Robinson, who'd died the same night that Newbie'd been in his accident, and the second was Lily Marks. I had grabbed her chart and readied to head to her room when I spotted Carla.

"Hey Carla, quick question," I said and she leant onto the counter curiously. I lowered my voice and asked, "Newbie's kid, did you know he was named after me?"

Carla looked utterly surprised and it was her turn to feel awkward finally. "You mean, you didn't know that?" I shook my head. "But, he told you?"

 _Damn, awkwardness is back on me again._  I shrugged. "Like I listen to half of what comes out of Barbara's mouth," I said and walked away indifferently. Inside, I was thinking frantically. Had Newbie ever told me that? You'd think I would've noticed. I always noticed when the kid said 'Perry,' mostly just because it annoyed me to no end when the kid was trying to be buddy-buddy, first name basis with me.

Brushing those thoughts away, I stepped into Lily's room. "Hey there, Lily, how are you doing?"

Lily looked up, surprised. "Hi Dr Cox," she said. "I'm okay." Even as she said it, the telltale twitching in her left arm said otherwise. "Where's JD? He hasn't been around in a while. The other doctor that was in here yesterday wouldn't tell me anything."

I inwardly groaned. God, when was today going to stop being so uncomfortable? That's it, first chance I had I am just bolting home to play Legos and watch  _Finding Nemo_. Hell, I'd even watch  _Lion King_  again just to get out of here. "He's not going to be working for a while," I said, hoping she would take it at that.

"Yeah, that's what the other guy said. C'mon Dr Cox, you don't lie. What happened?" Damn, clearly not.

"He was in an accident two nights ago," I said solemnly. I was really getting sick of explaining this to people. "His car crashed."

Lily's eyes had gone round. "Is he okay?"

"He will be."

"Oh, I was starting to get nervous," she admitted with a tentative laugh. "He came and took my parents out to talk to them all serious like and then he just stopped coming by. I thought he was avoiding telling me I was gonna die or something."

 _Shit_. This awkward thing keeps getting worse and worse. "Right," I said. Apparently the girl's parents hadn't filled her in on that little detail just yet. I longed to say something, just so she was prepared, but something stopped me. And it wasn't just the fact that I couldn't legally go behind her parents' backs and tell her. She was always so cheerful and carefree. If she knew she was dying, especially so soon, then she would get depressed and scared. I couldn't be the one to do that to her. However, now the uneasy silence that had filled in after my words was getting stifling. I had to push it away. "So, any change? Learn any interesting gossip from those magazines you've been reading?"


	11. My Little Things

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A JD Chapter.

_I don't think anyone appreciates just how spectacular lives are. When bad things happen everyone seems to wish that they could just go back and erase some portion of their life, but they don't realise just how sweet those memories are. The contents may not be happy but they are what shape us into the people we are. We take things for granted, like that last dinner we had with our parents, or the time we got beat up at summer camp, or even just a simple night at the bar with your best friends. Everything, the good and the bad, is who we are. And that's so much more significant when it's suddenly gone._

I reclined on the bed, watching the television aimlessly. Normally I would watch the people in the hall, trying desperately to remember anything I could about them but coming up with nothing more than what I'd been told by others. However, it was getting late and most of the doctors had gone home so the halls were quiet. Elliot had spent an hour with me at the end of the shift before getting teary-eyed and practically running away. Turk and Carla had come by to say goodnight and Dr Cox stopped by for a few minutes to check on me but had to leave to "go back to my cave and slave for the Jord-ominable Snowbeast and her face-sucking spawn," which I assumed was Cox-speak for "go home to his family." This all left me alone, mourning the fact that there seemed to be nothing good on television.

I hated being alone, it made everything about my situation worse. The rest of them all had families and friends to go home to. I had nothing. Or at least nothing I could truly remember. I knew I had friends and my son but, for the most part, everything seemed empty to me. Just knowing that they were there didn't replace that hollow feeling when I tried to recall our histories together. Relationships weren't conjured out of thin air but that was what all of my friendships felt like right now.

Shaking myself to get rid of those depressing thoughts, I forced my eyes to focus on the television again. Without noticing, I had settled the channel on some doctor show with a main character who reminded me a lot of Dr Cox, only with a cane. I imagined Dr Cox prowling the halls with a cane, popping into rooms and diagnosing the outrageous, one-in-a-million-chance diseases, half of which I had never even heard of before. (The fact that I remembered any of them still weirded me out to no end, by the way). It was almost more amusing than the actual show. Not to mention it gave me a really strange sense of déjà vu. Had I at some point seen Dr Cox doing that? It didn't seem too preposterous, I suppose.

"Hey JD." The loud whisper jerked me out of the fantasy and I glanced at the doorway in surprise. A young girl was there, a hospital gown fitting loosely on her frame and her dark blonde braid falling over her shoulder. She was sitting in a standard hospital wheelchair and her smile was big as she stared at me companionably. The only problem was I yet again had no idea who she was. "I found you. Mind if I come in?"

"Um, no, go ahead," I said and I quickly found the remote to turn off the television. The girl smiled gratefully and I watched as she laboriously rolled the chair to my bedside, apparently having to struggle with getting one of her arms to respond because the chair kept trying to spin in little half-circles. Once she seemed to be content with where she was, she leant forward and rested her arms on the edge of my mattress, still grinning.

"I wasn't sure I was gonna be able to find your room," she confessed with a laugh. "Dr Cox wouldn't tell me where it was, just that you were up here in ICU. He seemed to want to not tell me what happened to you but I don't know why. I knew you'd want me to come visit. We always have so much fun talking."

I could only stare dumbfounded, trying to figure out how I knew this girl. She looked to be about ten or eleven, so I supposed it was faintly possible that she was my daughter but I didn't want to consider that. Something about it just didn't seem right. Besides, surely Dr Cox or Kim would have told me if I had another, much older child. Not to mention one who was also a hospital patient. So who was she? When I looked at her I felt some sort of empty happiness stir in my chest but there was also an inexplicable sadness. What sort of person conjured that sort of feeling?

"I – I'm sorry, but who are you?" I finally asked.

The girl let out a hesitant laugh, her smile faltering as she looked up at me. Her expression was still carefree and childlike but her eyes had gotten dark with confusion. "What?" she gasped out, trying and failing to keep her tone as light as the half-smile on her face. "JD, whaddya mean?"

"It's nothing personal," I said quickly, realising I had somehow hurt her feelings and regretting it. Apparently when she said Dr Cox hadn't told her much she wasn't kidding. "I hit my head. I can't remember anything."

This made the girl's eyes go wide and she gazed intently at me, flicking back and forth between the bandages around my head and my eyes. She seemed to trust what she saw. "Oh, I'm sorry," she said. "Dr Cox didn't tell me that. He just said you were in a crash. You probably don't want strangers bugging you, I can leave if you like."

"No," I said firmly. "I could use the company, if you don't mind hanging around for a while." The girl beamed and then stood shakily from the chair and perched herself on the edge of my mattress. I scooted over as best I could to make room for her. "So, who are you?"

"My name's Lily Marks," she said, nodding as if to confirm it as true. "You're my doctor. Or  _were_ , I guess."

"Oh," was all I could say in response. I had been this little girl's doctor before my accident and then suddenly she had gotten shipped off to another doctor without any answers. Still, it was flattering that she had come to find me when she found out I was here and hurt.  _I must be a really good doctor._  A little bit of smug hope filled me at that. "Hopefully you didn't have to sneak away too far or you'll get in trouble trying to get back."

"Nah, I'm just on the floor below," she said with a shrug. "It was easy getting up here, there's like no one out there. This place always gets empty and creepy at night." She surveyed my injuries, from the head bandage down to the cast on my leg and then grimaced. "You got beat up pretty bad, didn't you?"

"Awful," I agreed with a laugh. Something about this little girl made me feel lighter, and the smiles and laughter came easier. She seemed to be brimming with optimism and happiness. "But I'll take all the pain over being empty up here," I added, pointing to my forehead for emphasis. "It's weird being around all these people who know me and remembering nothing."

"I'll bet," Lily said in a sort of horrified awe. "So, like, did you just forget everything about other people or did you forget your family too?"

"I even forgot who  _I_  was," I answered grimly, although not as grimly as I had felt before. That cheerfulness was contagious or something, it made my problems seem less daunting. "It took forever to remember my name and that's about the only thing I can remember. I didn't know I was a doctor and I don't know anything about my family except what my friends have told me. They brought in a bunch of photo albums and have been practically teaching me my life."

"Weird!" Lily said with enthusiasm. "Still, I think it would be just a little bit cool. Like you could forget all the bad things that happened and then just relearn all the good stuff. Could make life a lot happier."

"You'd think," I said slowly. "But honestly, I'd just like to remember anything right now."

"At least you can 'member how to talk," Lily pointed out. "That's something. You could be stuck, like, completely unable to talk or understand what people are saying. Then you'd be in a whole lot of trouble."

I laughed. "That's a good point," I eventually conceded. I glanced down, noticing that her arm was twitching in her lap and her feet would roll sporadically. "So, what's the matter with you? If you don't mind my asking, I mean."

"Oh, I'm dying."

The bluntness of this statement, said as off-handedly as though she were once again telling me what her name was, stunned me into silence. I stared blankly at her, trying to grasp onto what she'd said, but my mind refused. This little girl, too young to even be a teenager, was perfectly accepting of the fact that she was mortal. Unbelievable.

Sensing that I wasn't about to conjure up a sentence, Lily continued without me. "Well, no one has actually told me that but I know it's true," she admitted. "No one has even told me what I have, even though I know that my parents and the doctors know. Or I guess you don't anymore. But the day before yesterday, you pulled my parents out and you were talking to them all serious-like."

"That doesn't mean anything, I could have just been being professional," I offered.

Lily shook her head and laughed. "No, I know you, JD," she said. "You're just like me, you're only serious when it's something really, really serious. Otherwise, you're smiling, even if it's only with your eyes." I clamped my mouth shut, trying to find another argument, but she had a point. That did sound a lot like me, or at least who I felt I was. "Besides, after you left my parents came back in and they were acting sort of – _fake_. Like overly-calm and happy, like they were forcing it. It was like the way they acted when they were trying to tell me my grandpa died. And then yesterday, only Mom came in. She said Dad was stuck at work even though he wanted to be with me, but there were those puffy red rings around her eyes like she'd been crying. Neither of them came in today."

She shrugged, toying with a loose string on the hem of my blanket and still talking as calmly as before. "So I decided I would get answers from a doctor," she said. "I was a little freaked that you didn't come back because the other doctor that came in the next day wouldn't talk to me much. But then Dr Cox came in today and I knew I could get an answer from him. So after I found out where you'd gone, I made a joke about thinking you'd run away 'cause I was dying, and he got that really closed off look on his face and didn't talk much after that. I figured it was the truth and no one wanted to tell me."

As much as I wanted to argue with her until she changed her mind, I couldn't do it. There were no real holes in her reasoning except the fact that no one had confirmed it. Of course, the way she had described it sounded like as close to proof as she could get without someone outright saying it. Especially Dr Cox's reaction, because that sounded very much like the way he would behave. It was the same way he always got really professional and quiet when we touched on something awkward with my situation. So all I could say was, "Sorry."

"So am I," Lily said and for the first time, her smile faded just slightly. "I mean I've pretty much accepted that it's coming but that doesn't mean I'm really ready. I'm only twelve." She paused and sniffled. "I wanted to go to high school and learn to drive and go to the prom. Then I'd graduate and go to college and get married. I wanted to play on a softball team and swim in the Olympics."

"Hey, keep your chin up," I said, recognising the trembling lower lip as a sign that she was caving. "They didn't give you a deadline yet, you might still get to do all that." She nodded but that didn't stop the quivering. "C'mere," I said softly and lifted my right arm. Lily lay down next to me and curled into my side. I was silently grateful that most of my injured ribs were on the other side as she let out a choked sob and buried her face in my chest, releasing her tears. As she cried into my shoulder, I curled my arm around her narrow back and rubbed in small circles, making quiet shushing noises.

It had gotten completely dark outside before she finally quieted and, to my surprise, I realised she was asleep. Smiling, I turned the television back on and lowered the volume, gaze darting between the screen that was so quiet I only caught half of it and the girl curled up beside me.

In an almost morbid sort of way, having Lily visit me had eased my tension. It wasn't just her glowing optimism or obvious adoration of me, although those certainly helped. The plain truth was simply that next to her, my problems seemed minimal. So I had lost some memory and was a little banged up. I could recover; there was still some hope for me. There is no recovering from dying. No hope left there.

A male nurse poked his head in and his brow furrowed when he saw Lily lying with me. When I noticed the other man opening his mouth, I frantically put a finger to my lips and the man nodded, still looking confused. "Don't wake her, she just fell asleep," I whispered to the approaching nurse.

"Family?" the male nurse –  _murse_ , I thought with amusement – asked in a hushed voice.

"Lily Marks, patient downstairs," I replied. "She was my patient and we became friends. She just needed someone to talk to. She's dying."

The murse crossed his arms, looking disapproving. "We have grief counsellors for that," he said, shaking his head.

I scowled at this comment. "A good friend is way better than any shrink," I countered. "It doesn't take a PhD to console a friend."

"Whatever, Dr Dorian," the murse said, once again shaking his head. I wondered if I'd had some sort of conflict with this guy before the accident. Maybe I'd called him a 'murse' to his face. This almost made me smile but I hid it. "I'm gonna have to take her back to her room. Visiting hours ended an hour ago, patients are all supposed to be in their rooms."

"Just don't wake her," I said, carefully sliding my arm from around Lily's shoulders as the murse set her gently in the wheelchair. She groaned in her sleep but didn't rouse. "Oh and hey, if she does wake up can you tell her that she's totally welcome to come visit me when she wants?"

"I'll talk to your doctor about that," the murse said blankly and then left the room without another word, shutting off the light as he went. I watched him go, a little perplexed by his behaviour but brushing it away. If I'd done something to piss the guy off there was nothing I could do about it now. Besides, he might just be ticked because he is stuck in the hospital at night dealing with rule-breaking patients. This time, I actually did laugh.

Not feeling particularly tired at the moment, I lifted one of the photo albums down off the table, wincing at the sharp pain it sent through my left side when I moved, and turned on the bedside lamp. This book was new to me. Turk and I had only gone through the older and rather battered looking one while Dr Cox and I had stuck to the shoebox of pictures. This album seemed to be much newer, judging by the condition of the cover, and when I flipped it open the glossy photos featured faces much more similar to the ones I saw around here.

There was Turk, the man who was supposed to be my best friend since college. That jazzin' high-top was gone, instead sporting the shiny shaved head he wore now, but he was still looking as cool as ever. I envied that guy's ability to be totally chill at, like, all times. Except for when he saw a sugary sweet. Apparently being a diabetic really makes you miss sugar. And there was Carla, her curly hair all around her face and that sweet smile. There was something so soft and maternal about her, and she treated me like I was her own baby. Speaking of which, there was a picture of their actual baby, Izzy. Turk had informed me that her nickname was Mocha Cub and I had to admit I liked the ring to it.

Then down below that was a picture of Elliot, looking much more put together than in any of the pictures from the shoebox. No more straggly bangs and ill-fitting scrubs, now she had that rockin' haircut with the crisp makeup and all those pretty dresses under her lab coat. She had apparently left the hospital at some point and become a private practice doctor, something that Dr Cox said as though it were some sort of conversion to the dark side. My head slanted sideways thoughtfully.

_Dr Cox was dressed in a flowing brown Jedi robe and had a fluffy beard. He was staring down Elliot, who had curly buns on the sides of her head. "Do not go over to the dark side, Barbie," Jedi Cox said in an echoey sorta voice._

" _But I won't have to wear the ugly scrubs that make my chest look flatter," Elliot whined dramatically. "And they will pay me more so I can afford to buy pretty outer spacey stuff."_

" _Do not give in to the temptation," Jedi Cox said solemnly. "Greed and vanity is a path to the dark side, and once you follow it you will never be a good Jedi Doctor again."_

_Suddenly a man in a black cape with a hood that hid his face appeared beside Elliot. "Elliot, you will be able to have steady hours and not have to stay all night with patients," he said. Elliot gasped, again very dramatically. "And when you leave you can drop all of your patients onto Jedi Master Cox, like he used to do to you."_

_Elliot jumped up and down, clapping. "Yay!" she cheered. "Suck it, Dr Cox." She picked up a stack of charts and threw them all at Jedi Cox. He disappeared when they hit him and his empty robes fell in a heap on the floor, while Elliot strolled away arm and arm with the man in the black hood._

And for some reason, I felt that déjà vu again. "I wonder if Dr Cox was a Jedi at one time," I mused aloud before glancing down at the page again. I didn't fail to notice there were very, very few pictures of Dr Cox in the book anywhere. There were plenty more people I didn't recognise, though. One of a lanky guy with familiar blue eyes, a lopsided grin, and mussed brown hair caught my attention but there was no label on it so I pushed it aside for later. There were photos of me with a few different but all very pretty women, and I slid them out to read the names off the backs.  _Julie, Alex, Gift Shop Girl_ (what a weird name) _, Kylie, Danni._ I smiled at each of them but nothing triggered in my mind. The women were quite a strange collection, from a preppy brunette wearing a wizard's hat to the slightly aggressive looking blonde, but I still felt nothing. No memories of meeting, of dates, of fights, of endings. It was all blank.

Groaning in frustration, I slammed the book shut and pushed it aside, ignoring the noise it made as it fell off the bed and hit the floor, pages crinkling under the weight. In my mind, I was running over all the things I had learnt over the last few days. Not the big details like the names and important events. No, I was focused on the little details that stood out in each of the people I'd re-met.

The way Turk was always chiming in "now that's what I'm talkin' 'bout" and always playing the part of being cool; how he seemed to be craving my attention as much as if we were a couple; the various weird but cool nicknames he used for me; the way he would sometimes appear with a saltine cracker behind his ear that he seemed to completely ignore as if it were usual.

The way Carla called me different Spanish pet names or Bambi but in a way that made them seem endearing instead of condescending, like she was used to taking care of me; the way she seemed to be the only person who absolutely no one stood up to; the way she butted into gossip and just had to give out her own opinion and try to give everyone advice; the way she confessed that her husband might love me more than her as if it was common knowledge and not totally strange and depressing like you would think.

The way Dr Cox constantly seemed to have to stand like he was proving he was the boss; his attractions to girl's names, touching his thumb to his nose like some old gangster sign, and elongating words beyond reason; the way that occasionally, just occasionally, his tone would soften into something less than sarcasm and he'd say something with real meaning to it - before instantly finishing it with some mocking insult, of course.

The way Elliot was always fidgeting and seemed to move her hands, which were always freezing ass cold by the way, too much when she talked; the way her voice got faster and higher when she was getting upset; the way she constantly blew her hair out of her eyes; the way she said "frick" or some variation of it all the time; the way she avoided using the proper names for anything sexual; that beautiful look of pure compassion I saw every time I met her eyes.

I found myself wondering if I had ever noticed that look before the accident. Or any of those things for that matter. They seemed to be things that all of them did subconsciously, so I reasoned it wouldn't be that strange if I just silently accepted them and never noticed all the little secrets they gave away. The subtle hints of comradery, of friendship, maybe even of love.

Annoyed with myself and suddenly exhausted, I finally decided to sleep. My dreams were frightening.

_I was walking through a room of people but they were all shadowy, like the lighting in the room was very poor, and it was impossible to tell who any of them were no matter how close I got. I could hear voices calling my name; Turk, Dr Cox, Elliot, Carla, and even a few that I did not recognise even though they gave me a sense of comfort. But every time I turned to see where they were, I found only more shadowed shapes. I tried talking to them but all they did was continue saying my name and telling me to come back to them._

_Getting frantic, I began running through the crowd, screaming their names. Their voices were getting fainter, but even when I turned around and headed back the way I'd come they kept getting dimmer until I could barely hear. The dark figures were pressing in around me, making it harder to push through until finally I was trapped in the middle of the group with my friends' voices hardly more than sad, longing whispers in my ears._

_The words "just a dream," came to me in a recognisable voice and I felt panic rising higher in me. Were those friendly voices just dreams? Was there really no one waiting for me outside the darkness? I fought to get free but the shadows closed in on me despite my sobbed pleas and calls for help. "Hear me?" the same voice asked. "Just dreams." That was it, the voice had said it. The voices I heard, the comforting ones trying to call me back to something, were just dreams. There was nothing for me out there. Everything outside this empty shadowland was gone. The darkness completely overcame me, silencing everything, and once again my mind knew nothing._


	12. His Newton's Law

_Newton's Laws technically do not fall into the category of things that a doctor should have to remember. What with all the protocol and diagnoses and procedures that we have to remember, basic physics is just not that important. Unless, of course, its knowing that if you push the old geezer's wheelchair down the hall, he's just gonna keep rolling until he hits something. Newton's first law of motion, folks. Yes, I am all knowing. However, while they might not pertain to medicine, sometimes it seems like they might just apply to life. Once the ball gets rolling, it's bloody hard to stop it. Progress is affected by just how much force you put into moving forward. And every action and choice is gonna have some sort of opposing repercussion. Or maybe that last one is considered Karma…I can never tell._

Okay, there would be no sitting around with Newbie all day today. I had an entire stack of paperwork on my desk that needed to be completed by tomorrow or else I'd have to listen to that bumbling idiot of a lawyer following me around all day whining about some potential lawsuit about medications or improper documentation or something else equally boring. Dear God, if someone had warned me just how much paperwork was required in being a doctor before I had gotten into med school, well I would have just dropped out and become a male model/actor instead. I was sure I would look great on a commercial for exercise equipment…certainly a lot better than Chuck Norris. And then maybe I could meet Hugh Jackman and give that man the kick in the groyne he so deserved. This thought put a smile on my face and daunting paperwork at the back of my mind.

Still, there was no escaping the truth of the matter as I pulled my precious car into the parking lot. I paused to grin at that beautiful sign that blared ' _Reserved: Dr Percival Cox, Chief of Medicine_.' God I never got tired of seeing that. Reserved parking spaces, now that was power. Finally, I clambered out of the car, holding back a shiver at the chill air of the morning. It was just past six and I was here a lot earlier than necessary but I wanted to make sure I had time to get everything done. Besides, I wanted to get out of the apartment before Jordan woke up. She was still a bit pissy with me for sending Jack in to wake her up the morning before.

"Morning, Dr Cox," a cheery young resident said as she was walking out of the building, clearly just getting off the night shift.

"Bup, bup, bup,  _puh-lease_ , do  _nawt_  speak to me this early in the morning, Nameless Peon," I replied, making a face as if I was in pain to demonstrate just how much her chipperness was killing me. "I might just have to hurt you, I really might."

Sally Sunshine seemed to be just about as phased by my remarks as Carla usually was and she simply shrugged and continued on her way with a short wave. I found myself wondering just how on earth anyone could be that happy after being on-call all night. I was usually ready to commit murder by that time. Oh wait, I was usually ready to do that by the time I  _got_  to work. Shaking it off, I made my way into the hospital. All I needed to do was check on the two patients I was currently attending to, who would both likely still be asleep at this hour anyway, and then it was into the office where I'd be trapped the rest the day.

My first stop, Lily, proved to be out like a light when I got there. I stayed long enough to check over her vitals and dismally note the jerky movements of her limbs, even in sleep, before leaving. Outside some male nurse scoffed and shook his head.

"You got something to say there, Pinky?" I asked, raising an eyebrow.

"That one caused me a bit of trouble last night," the guy replied, almost scathingly. "Snuck out of her room after hours. Turns out I find her an hour later fast asleep in another patient's room."

"Who?" I barked, instantly fearing where this was going.

The guy looked confused. "That girl, the blonde one in there," he said as if it were obvious.

"No, you moron, who's room was she in?"

The nurse folded his arms indignantly before spitting out, a little sardonically, "Your lap dog." When I gave no visible reaction, although my insides were a raging inferno, the nurse continued, "That goofy doctor who's been chasing you around as long as I can remember. Dorian. Seems he thinks he can draw on his connections to your power because he was completely unbothered by just how many hospital rules he was breaking, just telling me that they were friends and were talking. Yeah, because it's not totally horrible that a dying patient leaves her room in the middle of the night, or that a young girl is sleeping in the same bed as a much older man like–"

Nurse Numb-Nuts never got any farther because in that second my hand flew out and closed around the front of the nurse's scrubs, dragging him close and nearly lifting him from the ground. I felt satisfaction at seeing the fear spark into his eyes. "Now you listen here, and you listen good," I said in a threateningly low voice. "You're gonna _nawt_  keep talking about JD like that if you want to keep that ridiculous looking head attached to your scrawny giraffe neck. As attending physician for both Lily and JD, I say that they can visit each other as much as they damn well please. That little girl needs someone to comfort her and JD has always been that guy because he has better bedside manner than anyone else in this hospital and she trusts him. And never for a second think that I will hesitate to end your career here because, quite frankly, it'd take about a hundred and seven of you to even come  _cah-lowse_  to the raw talent that JD has and if that kid needed any transplant I would personally reach into your miserable chest and rip the organs straight out of your body to keep him alive. Understand me?"

A few spluttered words escaped the nurse but nothing coherent. Feeling certain I had sufficiently scared the idiot, I released the front of his scrubs roughly, sending the guy staggering back a few awkward steps. He smoothed the front of his top and then turned round and left with his metaphorical tail so far between his legs it was threatening to curl into his belly. I smiled in satisfaction; I hadn't been able to berate someone like that in a long time and that release felt good. I was also grateful that Ted wasn't here yet because I knew that rant might have crossed into the area of harassment and I didn't want to hear about how that idiot nurse could file charges and how it would reflect on the hospital, because honestly everyone knew that there was no way Ted could win a case even if he was representing God Almighty.

Feeling a lot better now that I had relieved that growing urge to rail into someone, which had been getting almost physically painful in the last few days, I made my way back toward the elevator to head up to ICU and check on JD.  _Wait a second…_  I stopped short in the middle of the hall, my brow furrowed. Had I just used 'JD' while thinking about Newbie? That couldn't be right. When had I started using the kid's stupid nickname all of a sudden?

 _One time slip up,_  I tried to assure myself.  _You just got caught up in the high from ripping that nurse a new one, that's all. It's not like you said it before – Oh God._ My forehead wrinkled deeper in concentration. I hadn't said "JD" during my rant, had I? Couldn't be. I tried to figure it out but when I thought back over the ravings it seemed my mind firmly asserted a girl's name into every time I'd talked about the kid. But could that be trusted? It did seem oddly abrupt and forced, even in my head, like the names were chosen frantically. And were the names changing every time I rethought it or was I imagining it? Was this my subconscious trying to protect me from what I already knew deep down was happening?

 _Gotta fix this_ , I thought firmly, rubbing a hand over my face quickly. I couldn't start calling the kid by his name now, not after all this time. All that time and effort I had put into keeping the kid at arm's length at all times, close enough to keep an eye on him but far enough away that there couldn't be any deep relationship between us. As hard as I tried, there were definitely those moments when my emotions got carried away with me and I showed a little more affection than I meant to. I was well aware of the way JD looked up to me as a father figure but, even when I sometimes felt paternally protective of the stupid kid, I knew that sort of thinking couldn't be encouraged. The people that got close to me expecting the sort of relationship I knew that J-  _Newbie_  was, well they always ended up getting hurt. Or I got hurt. I didn't want to think about either of those happening.

 _Suck it up, suck it up. Get your head together and get back to normal, Per, or it's gonna end like it did with Pete._ Okay, so I didn't honestly see Newbie having an affair with Jordan (disregarding the fact that they had already had sex once before, since Newbie had no idea who she was then), but the memory of finding my wife wrapped in the arms of my protégé and confidante definitely managed to get me back into the right mindset. Alright, dumbasses, Dr Cox is back.

Squaring my shoulders, I finally moved from where I'd stopped and finished the journey to the elevator. I spent the trip giving myself little pep talks, coaxing my natural temperament back out until I felt like my usual self again.  _Why?_  The little voice in the back of my head spoke up randomly while I leant against the wall of the elevator, locking my knees for the jerk of its upward motion.  _That high felt so good, so free and great like you never get to feel normally. You defended JD like he was your own child, like you would defend Jacky or Jen, and it felt good to know you protected him. Why go back to your normal self and give up that wonderful feeling?_

I knew the answer to that: Newton's law of gravity. What goes up must come down. If I felt a high like that then surely it would be followed by something that was very much the opposite of high. I did not handle the opposite of high very well. I had just gotten to the point where I no longer dove straight into the bottom of a third bottle of scotch every time I had a bad day, for my family's sake, and I really wasn't going to risk ending up there again. And if that meant avoiding the highs and inevitable lows, hanging out in that neutral, numb middle ground, well then, damn it all, that was what I was going to do.

All of this was decided before the elevator doors opened to the ICU and I stepped out feeling level-headed once again. Just check in on Newbie really quick and it was into the safety of my office. I breezed past the few, clearly exhausted nurses and doctors still stumbling around the place, made easier by the fact that they dodged out of my way when they realised I was coming with my usual storm cloud overhead. Mercy was on my side because when I got to the kid's room he was still asleep.

Letting out a breath I hadn't realised I was holding, I picked up the chart, checking to see if the night doctor had written anything new. I heard the kid groan quietly but it didn't look like he was waking up. Probably just another nightmare. Either that or his pain meds were wearing down. I went back to my work, finishing up the chart and hanging it back on the end of the bed. That's when I spotted the photo album lying on the floor beside the bed, splayed out, spine up, with half of its pages bent beneath it.  _Must have fallen off the bed,_  I reasoned, stooping to pick it up while Newbie let out another moan.

When I flipped the book over I saw that the pictures in here were a lot more recent than the ones Gandhi had been showing the day before. Some of them looked like they could have been taken within the last year. All of them were of the usual gal pals, sometimes including that weird stuffed dead Labrador or a few different faces, generally females. As I flipped through I spotted Kim and Sammy, Izzy, that ditzy brunette who'd been even more of a klutz than the kid. There were Jordan and the kids, with a reluctant me half-visible in the background but clearly in the process of trying to get out of the shot. There was a strip of those photo booth black and white photos with Newbie and Danni, probably from that fair we had all gone to together. Dan. A slightly worn picture of the late Sam Dorian. A picture that looked like it might have been part of a Christmas card at one time, featuring a woman who looked like she might have been the kid's mum, as well as a man who looked a bit – or a  _lot_  – too young for her.

"Nnnhhhnnnn."

The pained whimper made me look up from the album and I saw that Newbie's face was pulled into a grimace. His eyes were flicking rapidly, almost frenetically, beneath the lids and the heart monitor was registering that his heart rate had picked up a few paces. His nostrils were flaring faster than normal and there seemed to be a sheen of sweat gleaming on his skin. Suddenly his hands fisted around the bedsheets until all the colour was bleached from his already pale fingers.  _Definitely a nightmare_ , I thought as the kid whined again.

Setting the book on the table with the others, I carefully approached the bedside. "Newbie?" I asked softly. I set a hand lightly on the kid's shoulder but this didn't seem to help. Those tight lips parted and they seemed to be moving to form words even if all that came out were unintelligible groans. He grimaced again and I moved to check that the morphine drip was still working. The moment my hand lifted from the kid's shoulder, Newbie let out a choked noise, his lips still twitching in the semblance of speaking and his fists getting impossibly tighter on the blankets. I instantly turned back and touched his arm. "Easy, Newbie," I said in a firm voice. "It's just a dream."

Once again this seemed to elicit a negative reaction. Newbie's groan got louder, this time coming out with a faint likeness to the word "no," and his entire body convulsed slightly. I anxiously took note of this; if the kid kept moving he was going to hurt himself by accident. I really needed to calm him down. "Easy there, kiddo. Ya hear me? Just a dream."

A muffled cry of agony slipped between the kid's lips and his body seemed to completely still. I hesitantly turned away, checking that the heart monitor was still reading a healthy rate. It was a little fast but not to the point of being dangerous just yet.

"No!"

I spun around as Newbie let out a strangled scream, bolting upright in bed. His eyes were wide and terrified, his muscles rigid, and he was gasping for breath. A steady stream of frightened, "No, no, help, please, come back, no," was forcing its way out between frantic breaths. I quickly recovered from my shock and rushed forward, placing my hands firmly on the kid's shoulders. It scared me when the kid jumped and gave a small scream, his hands releasing the blankets to instead latch onto my upper arms painfully tight. He was looking at me with an expression of utmost horror in his eyes.

"Whoa there, Newbie, calm down," I said, my doctor side taking over and allowing my voice to become more soothing. The kid was still panting out pleas of help and fear, eyes searching the room for some unknown monster, and his fingernails were biting into my skin. "It's okay, JD, you're fine," I continued. I felt relieved when the muscles in those narrow shoulder eased just a little and the pleas fell in volume. "That's right, you're safe," I coaxed. A nurse ran up to me, clutching a hypodermic of sedative and looking at me questioningly, but I shook my head.

"Listen to me, kid, you need to calm down." Hands eased from their death grip on my biceps and I felt the stinging after-bite of what I was sure would be ten moon-shaped indentations in my flesh. "Nothing's gonna hurt you here." Back muscles eased and his posture slumped just slightly under my hands. "It was just a dream."

Back-pedalling again. JD turned to fix me in his mortified gaze, body trembling violently. His eyes seemed startlingly sharp and for some reason my chest was feeling extremely tight, making it difficult to breathe right. It looked like the kid was trying to say something but every time his mouth opened his lips would start quivering and he pressed them shut again. "JD, you alright?"

A choked noise and suddenly his head fell against the front of my shirt. JD's hands were once again clinging to my upper arms like some sort of lifeline, but his body was shaking as he nestled his forehead in the middle of my torso. The shaking grew worse, hands losing their grip and falling limply at his sides, and that's when I heard the noise for what it really was: a sob. JD was crying.

This realisation hit me harder than Jordan could ever dream of doing. Despite all of the times I had called him a hormonal girl, I had honestly  _never_  seen JD cry. Not over losing his favourite patients, not over dealing with his black wife marrying someone else, not over any of the various fabulously failed relationships he'd had, not even when his dad had died. It seemed absolutely remarkable that this could be the first time I had seen the kid get teary-eyed in all the years I'd known him. And here he was, crying his eyes out.  _Ouch, pain in chest getting tighter. Am I having a heart attack?_

No, I knew what that feeling was. It was guilt and sadness. All that time of ridiculing the kid and he had turned out to be one of the emotionally strongest people I had ever known. It also pissed me off that in a moment as horrible as this, I was just concerned with the fact that this was that 'opposite of high' I had been afraid of. JD was having a complete breakdown and all I could think about was how much it was hurting me.

Gritting my teeth, I carefully wrapped my arms around JD, trying not to squeeze too tightly and hurt any of his other injuries. I ignored that inner voice reminding me that my old Newbie would be celebrating about finally getting that hug he'd always wanted. "Shhhh, shhh," I said softly. "It's okay, kid, you're okay."

"Not dreams." JD was struggling to talk through his sobs and I had to tilt my head down to hear what he was saying. "Not dreams. Real. Really gone."

I moved a hand slowly up and down JD's spine. "What's gone?"

"Me," JD choked out. His hands found the lapels of my lab coat and gripped them tightly. "Everything – me – all gone. Nothing there. It's empty."

 _And there goes that pain again. This keeps up I'm gonna collapse a lung._  I just continued to shush him, rubbing small circles over his back, until finally, the sobbing eased into shallow hiccoughs. A few minutes after that, JD managed to sit up and he brushed the backs of his hand not attached to an IV roughly over his cheeks. He seemed to be feeling embarrassed now, not looking up at me while he fought to control his hitched breathing.

"How're your ribs?" I asked, deciding to just skirt the topic and try to ease the kid a little. "They hurting?"

"Mm? Nah," JD said, his voice still sounding thick. He apparently noticed this because he cleared his throat a few times.

"Mmhhmm," I said sceptically. I knew there was no way that the movement and crying had managed to  _not_  affect his ribs but I let it slide. I reached over with my free hand and adjusted the morphine drip ever-so-slightly. "Well, you may want to not move around a lot for the next few hours, make sure nothing's gotten worse. If they start hurting really bad, you let me or a nurse know and we'll get you into radiology to check on them." JD just nodded slowly, still not meeting my gaze. "You wanna talk about it?"

This finally made JD look up in surprise, his eyes wide and only just a little scared. He seemed to be waiting for me to take it back but I just sat down on the edge of the mattress, staring at him expectantly. "It was just a nightmare," JD said, half-grudgingly.

"Sounds like a pretty bad one," I remarked calmly, "judging by what you were saying."

"Just unnerving," JD said and shrugged. "I think it was just the stress of all this amnesia stuff getting to me."

I nodded slowly, my mind processing that. So that's what the kid had been saying about things being gone. He'd been talking about his memories. Everything that made him JD was missing and it was leaving him feeling empty. Guilt twisted in my chest once again. "You gonna be okay?"

JD took a deep, steadying breath, trying to hide his wince as the movement shocked his side. After a noisy exhale, he looked up and met my stare again. "I think so," he finally said.

"Okay." I touched the kid's knee lightly and then stood up. "I've gotta actually do my job today but I'll come by and check in every few hours. If you need anything, have a nurse page me." JD nodded. "And no more hysterics, m'kay Priscilla?"

To my relief, this brought out a small smile from JD. "Yeah, okay Dr Cox."

I grinned and walked out of the room. I made it easy enough to the elevator but once the silver doors shut me in by myself, I slumped against the wall. I felt genuinely exhausted even though the day had just begun. Already I had experienced a ridiculous high and a crushing low, and now I remembered vividly why it was that I didn't bother with real emotions. All of that weightless bliss I had felt earlier had been brushed away by the dull ache that now resided in my chest.

And to top things off I realised that at some point I had started thinking of Newbie as 'JD' again. Why was this kid making it so difficult for me to remain neutral?


	13. His Trial-and-Error

_Sometimes when you're trying to solve a problem, you just gotta keep attempting it over and over with different variables until you happen to finally get lucky and find the right answer. We do that a lot in life, too; trying relationship and relationship until you chance across the right one, or working job and job till you find your passion, or trying alcoholic drink after drink until finding that one that numbs your pain the best. However, it often takes more than one shot before getting it right and in life, those errors are a lot harder to deal with than they are in, say, maths or science formulas. And they have more impactful results, too._

I started avoiding the kid's room a little, usually only stopping by to conduct my usual check-ups and make sure he was hanging on okay. I didn't mean to estrange the kid, I just couldn't handle being around him for now. At JD's breakdown I had let my guard down and realising that I had allowed emotion to get to me once again, well, it honestly scared me. Ever since JD had gotten hurt, I had been spending an obsessive amount of time taking care of him and it was only just occurring to me just how close I had let the kid get. That couldn't happen.

I tried to reason with myself that it was only because JD was so confused. JD had no idea that I had purposely and dutifully alienated him from the first day we had met, so I had softened up until the kid got his memory back together. At the same time, I knew that this was exactly the wrong thing to do. When the kid's memory came back he would be expecting me to keep being gentle to him, but that just wasn't Perry Cox. I couldn't keep that sensitivity up. Going soft over my kids had done enough damage, but if I started going soft over a colleague, well that was irreparable. I couldn't afford that with being so new to my position. People would be trying to take advantage of me at every turn. I  _had_  to be Badass Cox, there was no choice in the matter.

It had been easy enough to deal with for the first few days. I stayed away from the kid like he was the plague and buried myself in my work. I would occasionally swing by to find Lily Marks sitting on the bed with JD, watching television together or gabbing endlessly, but I would only pop in to check on them both and then leave again. From the hall, I would watch the way they both seemed to drink in each other's optimism and it almost looked like it made them both healthier. Then, when my chest began to feel tight, I would flee the scene and return to my desk work. Plus side, I actually got  _ahead_  in my papers for once.

By the fourth day, the distance was starting to wear on me. JD clearly noticed that I was practically shunning him and the smile on his face whenever I showed up was almost forced in a way. My chest twisted with guilt at this but I would push the feelings away. I needed to get back to being emotionally numb again.

Also, the kid's memory seemed to be making no progress what-so-ever. He was retaining all the knowledge we were feeding him but his personal revelations were few and far between, and when they came they were usually useless information instead of important facts. And, as the two-week anniversary of the accident passed without any serious improvement, I started to lose hope for the kid's condition.

The only thing that eased my guilt was the fact that the kid was very,  _very_  rarely left alone. He had a constant stream of visitors, sometimes more than one at a time because of how often Lily was in the room. Turk, Carla, and Elliot were constantly dropping by when they had a free minute and it wasn't uncommon to find them hanging around after their shifts ended and occasionally on their breaks. Kim came by at least every third day, bringing Sam with her. That was when I really saw the biggest change in JD; holding his little boy made JD light up and he almost looked as if he were perfectly healthy. Or at least he would if it wasn't for the constant presence of the bandages to serve as reminders. Hell, even Jordan and the kids swung by once to say hi and JD seemed to be amused when Jack called him Aunt Deejay.

Lily was doing nothing to ease my discomfort either. Her condition was declining rapidly. By the end of the two weeks, her muscle spasms had progressed to the point of leaving her essentially paralysed from the waist down. She always had to get an orderly to push her in a wheelchair to JD's new room, having been finally turfed out of the ICU a few days prior because he was no longer in critical condition. She occasionally lost track of her thoughts and had suffered more than one seizure, thankfully always when she was in her own room because I didn't want to think what sort of effect seeing that would have on JD. The personality changes were, so far, subtle enough to go unnoticed but the failing ability of her muscles was impossible to miss. Her eyes no longer followed as well as they should and her speaking came out vaguely slurred. It physically hurt me to realise how little time this girl still had for the world. At this rate, she would be in a vegetative state before the next two weeks were up and from there it was only to wait until her parents pulled the plug or she drifted off of her own accord.

It was killing me to think just how bad that loss was going to hurt JD, who had come to rely on her as his constant companion. She seemed to be the best at cutting through the fog of his amnesia and make him feel good again.

Day eighteen from JD's accident rolled around and I walked into the room, not at all surprised to see Lily sitting beside JD. I was surprised to see Sam nestled in Lily's arms. It worried me at first that a girl who could not control her muscles was holding an infant, but then I noticed JD had an arm around her shoulder and his hands were firmly holding her arms in place despite the twitching of her muscles. The young doctor was smiling at her encouragingly and Lily stared down at Sam with a look of absolute adoration. I forced back the urge to smile.  _Emotionally numb_ , I reminded myself.

"Hey there," I said and both of them looked up. Lily was beaming but JD's smile once again did that odd flicker and then returned in fully forced force.

"JD's lettin' me howd 'is baby," Lily said enthusiastically, the weak muscles in her jaw cutting most of the hard consonants off her words. Sadly, she was starting to talk at the same level as Jack. "I've ne'er hewd a baby 'fore."

I simply gave my small, doctorly smile. There was an odd lump in my throat as I fully comprehended what was going on. JD was helping Lily to hold a baby because she had never gotten the chance and they all knew that she wasn't going to have many more opportunities to do the little things that no one but a dying person really appreciated, like knowing that glowing bliss of holding an infant in your arms. Even as a patient, JD was going the extra mile for his patients. It was almost a relief to know that some things never changed.

"Lily, your parents should be here soon," I finally said when the lump faded, shooting a glance at the clock for good measure and seeing JD and Lily's eyes follow my gesture. "You ready to head back up to your room?"

"Can' dey jush come shee me 'ere?" Lily asked with a small pout. "JD won' mind, do ya?"

"Not at all," JD said instantly. I knew that he was willing to do anything that would keep Lily happy. It seemed almost ironic to me as I realised the way Lily smiled up at JD was in the same way a child would when being doted on by their parents. JD, who had always tried to find his own in me, had become a father figure to the little girl.

 _Well, someone has to be,_  I thought to myself bitterly.  _Her own isn't doing a good job at it._  Lily's father rarely showed up at the hospital anymore, despite the fact that her mother visited every day. Mrs Marks had confessed to me that it was because he couldn't stand to see his daughter like this; that he couldn't handle it and he wanted to remember her how she used to be and not how she was now.  _Load of bull. Coward._  I agreed it was difficult to watch her slowly dying but avoiding her was just selfish. If that ingrate thought it was hard for him, maybe he should imagine what it was like to sit there knowing you were dying and have your own father avoid you. Who could honestly let their child die alone in a hospital? Thank god for JD keeping her from getting too depressed.

"Okay," I agreed with a small nod. "I'll go back up to your room and when your parents get here, I'll bring them down." We might as well keep Lily comfortable and happy while we could, Lily's mother could understand that. Besides, maybe it would be humbling for her to see how much trouble JD put into keeping her going. I found myself hoping - praying to whatever higher powers there might or might not be up there - that today would be the day her father showed up so he could see what a real father should do for his dying child.

When both of the Marks showed up, I could have jumped in the air with smug eagerness.  _Thanks for putting in a word to the Big Guy for me, Laverne_ , I thought, shooting a quick glance skyward.  _And Ben_ , I added as an afterthought. This sort of help didn't seem particularly like Ben behaviour but when I rationalised that it was a way of showing me how proud I was of JD then it made more sense. Ben was always the one pushing me to let JD get closer after all.

"Where's Lily?" a frantic Mrs Marks asked when she saw the empty bed, which I quickly stood up from.

"Don't worry, she's fine," I assured her quickly. "Lily is down the hall in Dr Dorian's room visiting with him. I told her I would bring you down there."

Mrs Marks let out a loud sigh of relief but Mr Marks' expression remain stoic; a blank, lost look. I gestured for them to follow and led them back to JD's room. Lily was still cradling Sam when we arrived, talking to him cheerfully. The sound of our arrival made her look up.

"Hi, Mom," she said brightly and then her eyes fell on her dad and her smile faltered. Mr Marks still looked vacant but he gave her a half-smile. "Hi, Daddy."

"Lily, honey, how are you today?" Mrs Marks asked, bustling to the bedside. "Who's this?"

"Thish ish Shammy," Lily answered, grinning from ear-to-ear as she glanced first at the baby and then at JD. "JD ish lettin' me howd 'im 'cause I ne'er hewd a baby 'fore." The gratitude in Mrs Marks' eyes as she looked over at JD was astonishing and she gave him a watery smile.

Deciding that it would be best to excuse myself before the emotions in the room turned out to be contagious, I turned and left. I was surprised to hear someone say my name.

"Dr Cox," Mr Marks said. I stopped and turned back to the man, who had followed me out into the corridor. "I – I don't like this situation," he said, awkward but assertive.

"What situation?" I asked. What, his daughter dying? Who  _would_  like that situation?

"Lily spending so much time in there with Dr Dorian," Mr Marks said and the awkwardness had left his voice. "It's not healthy, a sick little girl spending so much time alone with a grown man."

This was the second time that I had heard this sort of statement and my anger flared just as much this time as it had before. Very possibly more so. What kind of person did these imbeciles take JD for? Hands curling into fists at my side, I forced my expression to remain neutral, if only because we were still standing in front of the window to JD's room and I felt someone's eyes on us. "What do you think is going on?" I asked, my low voice betraying the rage I didn't dare exposed physically. "He is an invalid doctor who can't even get out of bed without help, and she is dying."

"She is a defenceless young girl being left alone with a brain-damaged man," Mr Marks said and he seemed to feel no qualms in showing that he was angry. "She could not move or speak to get away from him if something were to happen. Do you see the way he is touching her, arms all around her like that? The way he has no shame at being so physically close to her? I tell you, he has ulterior motives in this–"

"No, Mr Marks,  _I'll_  tell  _you_  what," I interrupted, having had enough of this. "I have known JD for almost eight years and he is  _the_  most morally sound person I have ever known. I can promise you by the distraught way he reacts whenever we get a patient in here who has suffered what you are trying to  _imply_  that he is doing to your daughter, that there is no _-ho-ho_  way in high heaven that he could even  _consider_  such a thing." I made sure to keep my voice low and a falsely calm expression on my face for the sake of the people in the room. I waited until Mr Marks had opened his mouth before starting in again, just to have the pleasure of cutting him off, continuing in that emotionless but still strikingly blunt doctor voice I used to explain options to stubborn patients.

"You wanna know what it is that JD is actually doing in there? He is in there keeping your daughter alive a little longer. He spends most of his every day talking to her and keeping her spirits up. Lily is dying, and very quickly, Mr Marks, and if it were not for him she would spend the majority of her time sitting alone in a blank hospital room because her own parents don't even come to visit her. Through these last few weeks on earth, your daughter would have been almost always alone if it were not for JD, who might I add has a  _helluva_  'nough problems of his own to worry about, letting her sit with him every day when he could be focused on overcoming his amnesia so he can get back to a normal life.

"So you know what it is that JD is doing in there?" I paused, waiting to see if Mr Marks would dare answer, but the other man only stared in silence. "Well, he's sitting in there being a father to that girl because  _you_  are too much of a coward to do it."

There was a resounding silence following this as Mr Marks stared at me with a burning intensity, his solid, expressionless face not moving. Both of us were breathing heavily and neither of us broke the eye contact, waiting for the other to make the first move. Finally, Mr Marks seemed to deflate and he walked back into the room. I almost felt a swell of pride at managing to fix this problem before I heard the man say, "Hey, sweetie, I'm sorry but I've got to get going. An emergency just came up at work. But I'll come back later, okay?" Lily gave a tragic hum of assent and it almost looked like there might be tears in her eyes as she watched him leave the room without so much as a goodbye kiss.

I shook my head and walked in the opposite direction, afraid I would punch Mr Marks if I got close to the man again. Not that I wouldn't take sheer pleasure from that but I knew that it would still upset Lily, even if he deserved it, and I wanted to keep her happy as much as JD or her mother. Later, I would have to explain the argument to Mrs Marks so she would be prepared when she got home, but that could wait. Right now, I really needed a coffee. Or a scotch, if it weren't for the fact I was working and had vowed I wasn't straying down that road again.

I counted on Mrs Marks to stay until visiting hours ended, just like she always did, and I was pleased to find that she was nothing if not dependable. When I got back to JD's room at eight that night, she was still sitting beside JD's bed, talking with the two patients with a sort of sad smile in her eyes. Apparently, Kim had come back for Sam because the infant was gone. "Excuse me, Mrs Marks," I said and all eyes turned on me. "Sorry, visiting hours are over."

"Oh, right, thank you," she said, grabbing her purse and standing up. She said an affectionate farewell to her daughter, kissing her on the forehead. Then, to the surprise of everyone, she stooped and kissed JD's cheek lightly as well, murmuring a quiet thanks and goodbye. JD smiled in pleasure as he repeated her words.

"Before you go," I said quickly after Mrs Marks had followed me out into the hall, "there's something I wanted to talk to you about." The woman nodded me on, wringing her hands around the strap of her purse anxiously. "I am afraid I got into a disagreement with your husband this morning and I felt you deserved to know that and know why." Again, she merely nodded. "Your husband complained to me that he felt uncomfortable having your daughter spending so much time alone with Dr Dorian and he seemed convinced that there was something – _unhealthy_ – about their friendship." A gasp. Well, at least it was finally something other than a nod. "I'm afraid I got a little defensive about this and I said some things that were probably uncalled for. I wanted to let you know what happened so you would be prepared for when you get home."

Mrs Marks had covered her mouth with one of her hands and she was staring past me back in the direction of where JD and her daughter were still talking cheerfully. "He thought that – that JD was–" she faltered, apparently not able to force the words out. "That he was  _hurting_  Lily?" My mouth a grim line at the thought, and at her inability to voice what both of us were thinking, I gave a firm nod.

"Oh, dear God," she breathed in a quick rush. "How could he think that? After everything that she's said JD does for her? Every time I visit, she tells me how JD goes out of his way to make her happy. He makes her forget…" Mrs Marks' voice failed again and she lifted a hand to dab at her eyes. "I'm so sorry, Dr Cox, for what Tony said about your friend. I know he's been stressed dealing with this but I hadn't expected him to do something like that."

"Don't apologise," I said firmly but as gently as I could manage. I didn't bother putting in the correction that JD was not my friend, merely an employee and colleague. _Who are you fooling now?_ that obnoxious voice in the back of my head taunted. "I only wanted you to know what happened so you wouldn't walk into that unprepared when you got home."

"Oh," Mrs Marks said and the sadness in her face increased. "Well, Tony's not actually staying at home right now. He's – he's gotten an apartment where he's staying with a friend." She didn't need to say the rest of the story, I had heard this tale a thousand times; the loss of their child was too difficult for the couple to survive and they parted ways. She could apparently tell I knew because she added, "Would you not say anything to Lily about it? I don't want her to know. It'll be better if she doesn't. I don't want her to think that this was her fault. She shouldn't have to die with that sort of guilt."

"I understand," I said. She thanked me, touching my forearm lightly, and walked briskly out of the hospital. Sucking in a calming breath, I went back into JD's room. "Alright, Lily, time for you to get back in your own room. I have to go home so I can't stay tonight to stop the nurses from antagonising you."

Lily frowned grudgingly, but she knew better than to argue when I scooped her up and lowered her into the wheelchair. "Bye, JD, danks for lettin' me howd Shammy."

"No problem," JD said with a bright grin. This did something to ease the frown on Lily's face. "I'll see you tomorrow."

I had started the chair for the door when Lily suddenly looked over her shoulder and added, "Love you, JD." I froze in absolute shock but JD took it in stride.

"Love you too, Lils. Get some sleep." He looked up at me and nodded, pulling me back to reality enough to get her out of the room. I had noticed the father-daughter type relationship between them, of course, but this was enough to effectively stun me. Their parting had sounded completely casual and natural, as if she was truly his daughter and she was saying goodbye before heading for the school bus.

"'E mishes you." Lily's abrupt statement pulled me out of my thoughts and I looked down at her questioningly. "JD. 'E mishes you. Why don' you stay an' talk 'nymore?"

"I'm busy with work," I said simply. "I run this place, Lily. That means a lot of work to do."

"You ushed to stay and talk 'nyway," she pointed out, tilting her head back to look up at me. "'E shaid it's harder to 'member things now than at firsht and I dink it's 'cause you don' come. And–" she paused, clearly considering whether she should say what she was thinking or not, "it makes 'im shad you don' come, 'cause he dinks you are mad, even dough I shaid you're not. It also makes 'im crazy dat 'e 'members you best but can't tell why and you don' talk to 'im."

We had reached Lily's room and I was grateful for a valid reason to end this conversation. That uncomfortable pain in my chest was back again and I was starting to feel just a little queasy. Had there been something wrong with my lunch? That tomato had tasted a little spoiled. How was it that Lily had managed to say so many things that had been bothering my conscience? Carla must have been giving her mind-reading lessons or something. There was no way every one of my fears could have been true for JD to confess to her, and for her, in turn, to guilt me with.

"Alright, enough playing Dr Phil for you, missy," I said, forcing a good-humoured smile onto my face. I scooped her out of the chair and slipped her into the bed, helping her pull the blankets up over her legs. Lack of use had already caused significant muscle atrophy, turning her lower limbs white and skeletal, much like the rest of her body was beginning to turn. "Now, I think you should go to sleep. You've had a long day."

"Promishe you'll talk to 'im?" Lily asked, her quaking hand landing on my bare forearm with surprising force for someone with so little muscle control. She was staring up at me, her eyes clearly focused for once, and there was a pleading sincerity in her gaze. "For me?"

Ouch, the words no one could possibly escape. Even me, the great Perry Cox, had no way to dodge out of that one. "Okay, I promise," I said. "For you, I'll talk to him until I'm blue in the face."

Lily laughed weakly and laid her head down on the pillows. "You'd look funny blue," she murmured sleepily, and she was asleep before I could chuckle in reply. I set her limp hand on the bed, leaning down to brush a strand of loose hair off her forehead, and left.

Alright, so trying to avoid JD to make things go back to normal was obviously not working. Time to find another plan. Thoroughly exhausted from what had proven to be a remarkably long and wearing day, I hastily gathered my stuff and readied to leave, only stopping to say a quick goodnight to JD before going home.

Because I'd promised Lily.


	14. My Five Stages in Five Minutes

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A JD Chapter.

_One of the single worst things about life is saying goodbye. All good things, and mercifully the bad things too, eventually come to an end. Sometimes you're expecting them, like when you know that your vacation is ending and you have to go back to work. Other times, they come out of the blue, like when your favourite restaurant suddenly goes belly-up. But no matter how they come at you, farewells always suck. What really matters, when it comes to it, is making sure that you do them right and never take for granted the chance to have experienced the thing before it ended._

It had been a trying two weeks for me, to say the least. Of course, anyone would agree that getting into a car wreck, nearly dying, losing your entire history, and being strung up in a hospital with no idea who you are and in serious pain all the time... Well, it just doesn't sound like it's the most ideal way to pass the time. Honestly, though, the only part of that which really bothered me was the memory thing. And the serious pain thing, but with my best friend morphine, I coped okay. What had been so horribly frustrating was the fact that the one person who my memories seemed to be clinging so tightly to was avoiding me like I was some sort of mutant, disease-carrying monster.

I was not left alone to brood a whole lot, thankfully, or I might have driven myself into another breakdown. I had had a few of them, but always at night when I was alone and I made sure that no one would be able to tell. Especially not my friends. They seemed to draw some form of comfort from the fact that I always appeared happy despite it all. I assumed that it was because of my personality, and my behaving like I used to was a hopeful sign of my possible recovery. But frankly, I was making absolutely no improvements and I knew it.

Still, when my friends came in they were always trying to display complete confidence in my ability to come back. Well, except maybe Elliot, who would get teary-eyed every time I failed to understand some form of inside joke I assume I would have known before. This usually resulted in her murmuring a high-pitched apology and running out of the room with her hands over her mouth, whispering "frick" to herself. Every time this happened I felt a pang of guilt in my chest. I wasn't sure whether this was a new development or some of my old self coming back to me, but I really,  _really_  liked her. I mean, she's neurotic and insane and obsessive and a bit of a control freak, but there was something so sweet and innocent under all that. I think – although I'm not sure because I can't remember what it's supposed to feel like or even if I'd ever felt it before – but I think I'm falling for her.

Turk and Carla have been real lifesavers, too. Carla always seemed to sense when I was starting to get overwhelmed and stressed, and she managed to calm me down without ever revealing that I needed calming down in the first place. That Izzy's a lucky kid, she's got an  _awesome_  mom. And, for some reason whenever, Turk even walks into the room I feel myself smiling. Maybe it's more of my old life coming back or maybe it's just his infectious personality, but whatever it is, it's good. I'd managed to relearn most of the nicknames we used and he seemed to almost explode with happiness when one day I randomly reached up and pulled the saltine cracker from behind his ear. He was ecstatic that I had remembered how to play Find the Saltine (pretty self-explanatory, really), and I couldn't bring myself to admit that I only grabbed it because it was weirding me out. Still, we always managed to have fun and, on evenings when Carla was working later than him, he would bring the Gilmore Girls DVDs in and we would watch the show together. Turns out I still really like the show, accident or no.

And, despite having no inkling about our relationship, I am so utterly grateful to Kim for bringing Sam in so often. She rarely stayed in the room very often, usually dropping Sammy off and then heading down to the coffee shop or to run errands while I "babysit." I didn't care that she did this because being with Sam made me feel good again. When I hold him and he smiled up at me, it felt like there was one less hole in my life. I knew, without a doubt, that Sammy's my little boy and that he loves me and I wanted to be there for him for the rest of his life. He may not be able to talk but he tells me more about myself than anyone else with their stories and photo albums could.

Of course, my strongest lifeline was Lily Marks. She had come to sit in my room every day since she found me, rejoicing when I was moved down onto her floor so it was a shorter trip, and we talked from the moment she got here to the minute she had to go back to her room. We talked about everything, from funny stories I had learned about my friends to celebrity gossip she read out of the magazines her mom brought her to her own stories from soccer camps and weekends at her grandpa's house before he died. It never really mattered what we were talking about, in the end; we just drew comfort from having someone else to be able to talk to. My friends were always trying to talk to me about the past that I couldn't remember, which made me feel out of the loop, and her parents had stopped showing up quite as often so she would have spent all her time alone. We were always there for each other and we didn't have to talk about the fact that I couldn't remember the previous thirty-something years of my life or that she only had a few weeks left of hers. We were each other's comfort blanket.

The big hole in this happy little thing was the fact that Dr Cox had stopped coming to hang out like he used to. For the first few days I was here, he had come in and spent a good part of every day in with me. He never said a whole lot but just having his presence there had made everything feel safer. It was like he was this shield that protected me from all the negative thoughts in my head and from the pressure of having no memory of myself. I still had no idea who he was to me, although I had deduced that he was probably my boss since he ran the hospital where I had worked, but I knew there had to be more to it than that. Why would the person I felt the most connection to be just my boss? I had considered the possibility that he was my father, at one point, which sort of felt right in my head, but then I found the pictures of Sam Dorian and I knew that this man was my dad. But then who was Dr Cox?

The puzzling questions only got worse when he stopped showing up. It had been after that day when I had the first really bad nightmare. I had had a few nightmares before - to be honest, I had them just about every night - but this one had been worse than the others and I had woken up screaming. Dr Cox was there and he comforted me while I cried myself into a state of embarrassed calm. Why had I cried in front of him? That was bad. I had expected mocking jibes but instead he had been extremely understanding, which I knew was weird even without remembering. Dr Cox just wasn't the sort of guy to watch a man cry and not make some joke about him being a girl. And then after that day he had stopped coming.

I tried to rope him into conversation when he came in but he kept his answers short and left once he was done with checking vitals. Gradually I just gave up, retreating into an inner cocoon of rejection that I kept hidden from everyone but Lily. She understood me; she had been telling me about how her father never came to see her anymore and she thought he didn't love her because she was dying. I had managed to convince her that wasn't the truth, just like she had tried to convince me that Dr Cox wasn't angry at me for breaking down, but deep down, both of us still believed our own fears.

As I watched Lily slowly declining healthwise, I couldn't fathom how her father would not want to be there for her. How could a parent not want to be with their child for every last second they had of life? Especially when the parents knew that their child didn't have very long to go? I knew that if Sam were dying, I would never leave his side for a second, even if it meant I stayed in that hospital for years. So I did the best thing I could think to do for Lily, and I made sure that I stayed with her and kept her happy for every moment that I could. I stepped up to the plate that I felt her parents had dropped and did everything that I could to keep her smiling and keep her mind off her impending deadline. And a few days ago, when she was dozing off next to me, I had whispered for her to just fall asleep and she had mumbled an, "m'kay, Daddy," before slipping off with her face nestled on my shoulder. For a second I had stiffened but then relaxed with the knowledge that I loved her like she was my own daughter and if I could be a father for a girl who felt she had none, then that was exactly what I would do. I owed her that much, that was for sure.

I tried to fulfil as many of her little secret wishes as I could. I let her draw shaky pictures all over my cast because she liked to draw, and when she got frustrated because the pictures were wiggly since she couldn't hold her hand right, I assured her they were the most beautiful flowers and puppies I had ever seen. After that, she had beamed and she bent to add a scribbled "Get better JD" with a heart and her name underneath it. The nurses had frowned at the mess of my cast but I loved it. Then when she came in one day while I had Sam and she told me that she had never gotten to hold a baby before, I helped her to cradle him. She didn't even seem bothered by the fact that I had to hold her arms firmly with my own so she didn't drop him. She simply beamed at my little boy and cooed and baby-talked to him in her weak, slurred voice. I had fought back tears during this.

That was the day Dr Cox brought Lily's parents down to my room instead of making her go back to her room. I had met her mother a few times but this was the first time I had met her father. The expression on his face, as if he had absolutely no emotions, frightened me. He said nothing and when Dr Cox had left, he followed him out into the hall. Lily was talking with her mother about Sam, but I watched the two men exchange words which I could tell were heated, and then her dad had come in to say he was leaving. The first words he had said to her were goodbye. I wiped the tears from Lily's cheeks after he had disappeared.

Later that night, after Lily and her mother had gone, I was sitting in the silence trying to focus. For some reason, the memories seemed to be getting gradually harder and harder to grasp. When I had first woken up over two weeks ago, little things could trigger me into remembering things. They were always little things, just a name or a place or even just that vague sense of familiarity, but they gave me hope. It meant that my memories weren't beyond my reach. But as time had passed, that fuzzy barrier separating me from my past had gotten thicker and it was a lot less often that I managed to drag some minuscule detail through it. As much as I tried to cling to optimism, my hopes were fading.

A noise caught my attention and I looked up to see Dr Cox standing in the door. He looked a little uncomfortable and I wondered if he was here for one last vitals check for the night. I glanced back down at my hands to resume my musing.

"Get some sleep, eh, Mary?"

I looked back up again in surprise, in just enough time to catch Dr Cox giving me a small smile before turning and walking away. I barely managed to yell out, "G'night, Dr Cox," at his retreating back and I saw him lift a hand in farewell before vanishing from my line of sight. For a long time, I just stared at the doorway in amazement, trying to grasp what had just happened. After two solid weeks of ignoring me as best as he possibly could, Dr Cox had randomly dropped by to say goodbye before going home. Bizarre much? And to top it off, he had called me Mary. Since my breakdown he had only ever called me JD, but never Newbie or some girl's name. It was then that I realised I actually kinda liked the names. They were normal. They meant that he was acknowledging my presence. When he called me by just my name, it meant I was just a patient he was addressing. Coming from Dr Cox, Newbie or Insert-Girl's-Name-Here were sort of like terms of endearment. A nickname, just for me. Or a good couple dozen nicknames, really. A burst of pleasure filled me and, for the first time since my accident, my sleep was peaceful and relaxing.

The next day, I grinned upon seeing Lily in front of Dr Cox as he came to make his first of the morning check. "Morning there, Chloe," he remarked as they entered the room and I thought I saw the smile on Lily's face brighten. Dr Cox settled her on the bed beside me and then, to my surprise, dropped down into the visitor's chair and propped his feet up on the corner of the bed with his arms loosely folded on his chest. While Lily and I gossiped about anything we could think of, as usual, Dr Cox simply sat there and pretended to doze but it didn't bother either of us. He was there and that was what mattered.

"Oh, 'ave you sheen the drailer for dat new Ecksh-men movie?" Lily asked me brightly, quivering with excitement. By now, I could tell the difference between her tremors and whether they were medically or excitement induced. "Dat guy who playsh Wolverine, 'Oo Jackman, 'e ish so 'ot." Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Dr Cox's jaw clench and he sat up very quickly, trying not to glare at Lily. "Whad I do?"

"He just doesn't like Hugh Jackman," I said by way of explanation, giving a one-shouldered shrug. Both sets of eyes suddenly fixed on me in shock. I very nearly repeated Lily's question of "What'd I do?"

"Newbie, when did I tell you that?" Dr Cox asked suspiciously.

"When you – you were–" I froze, thinking hard but coming up with no distinct memory. I had no memory of having ever been told it but I knew for a fact that Dr Cox absolutely hated Hugh Jackman. An ecstatic grin split my face as I said, "You – you _didn't_."

"You 'membered on your own!" Lily squealed in celebration. Dr Cox could only stare at me in all too obvious disbelief. I would have thought this very weird if I wasn't just as stunned. After all this time of the details evading me, I had managed to remember something else on my own again. Maybe the hope wasn't all gone.

Dr Cox left after only an hour but I was still too psyched to be bothered. He had stayed for more than five minutes and I was satisfied with that. Whenever he came back for checks he would stand and chat for a few minutes, mostly to berate Lily for her love of Hugh Jackman, but the tension seemed to have cleared a lot and it was the happiest day I had known in a while.

It got better when Turk came and checked on the sutures in my head and informed me they were coming great and my hair was even starting to grow back - at which point I had a mini-panic-attack at the thought of my hair having been shaved - and that in a few days they could take off the bandages. This exciting news was celebrated with a round of chocolate pudding cups that Turk snuck up, managing to hide them from Carla who would kill him if she found out he was eating sugar since he'd apparently already had his bi-yearly chocolate bar. Poor C-Bear.

Later that evening when Elliot was getting off her shift, she came in and talked to me again, and for once I felt I was actually able to follow most of what she was saying at that lightning pace. That fluttery feeling in my chest was getting stronger and I knew now that I had developed at least a very strong crush on her. When she went to leave she bent to kiss my cheek as usual and, to my surprise but not to my displeasure, it wound up landing right at the corner of my mouth. We both blushed scarlet and she left quickly, but I saw her smile reflected in the window as she did and it mirrored my own grin.

I drifted off easily shortly after and once again, my sleep was calm and comforting.

_I was dressed in thick, furry snow gear as I trekked through a big expanse of white. Ahead of me was a huge crowd of penguins and I crept forward carefully, afraid of attracting their attention. Suddenly, the piece of ice I was standing on began pitching wildly and I yelped, trying to steady myself. The penguins all looked up and I was scared to see they were all now wearing ninja headbands. With war cries, they launched at me and attacked, making the weak ice under me wobble dangerously again-_

"Damn it, Alice. Wake up, would ya?"

"That penguin stole my underwear!" I blurted in surprise and fear. How had he done that? I was still wearing my pants! I blinked a few times and the white flatland was suddenly much darker. Wait a second, I wasn't wearing pants. Why was I not wearing pants? Did the penguins steal those too? I blinked several more times, attempting to figure out just what happened.

"Good Lord, Veronica," a voice said from above my shoulder. Why was Dr Cox in Antarctica? A sharp whistle made me flinch and suddenly my vision seemed to clear. I wasn't in the tundra, I was in a hospital room. Oops, it was just a dream.

"Dr Cox?" I asked blearily, glancing up at him. It was really dark in the room and I could tell it was still night. With a little work, I got an idea of Dr Cox's expression. Why was he angry? Was I not supposed to sleep? Or was he just mad that I let the penguins steal my underwear? Oh right; no penguins, no underwear, just a dream.

"There you are," Dr Cox said but his sarcasm seemed a little forced. His forehead was wrinkled, hair dishevelled, and his mouth was set in a firm, thin line. "Newbie, you gotta wake up and listen to me, okay?"

I nodded slowly, rubbing the sleep out of my eyes and vainly trying to repress a yawn. "What's up?" I asked, again taking in the late hour with bewilderment.

Dr Cox quite abruptly sank into the chair by my bed and rubbed his hands up and down his face and then into his hair. I knew that sign, that meant he was stressed. "Lily's gone."

"Gone?" I asked, confused. "Where?" Lily couldn't possibly go anywhere, she couldn't walk or even move her own wheelchair. Unless maybe she had an electronic one. Those would be fun to drive around in.

" _Gone_ , Newbie," Dr Cox said, emphasising the first word heavily. He sat forward with his elbows on his knees, staring at me expectantly. I couldn't figure out what he meant. Gone? What was that supposed to – oh. Oh God.

"No," I gasped out, suddenly feeling like my chest had caved in. She was gone. Gone.  _Dead_. "No," I said again, this time with defensiveness. It couldn't be. She couldn't be gone. She was just in here this morning, talking to me about X-Men and arguing with Dr Cox about whether or not Hugh Jackman should be shot. Lily couldn't be dead. "No."

"It was her Huntington's. She had another seizure," Dr Cox was saying in that overly slow, overly calm voice. "Her body couldn't take the stress and her heart stopped. They tried and tried, but by the time they got her heart restarted she was already brain dead. Her mother made the decision to pull the plug about three minutes before I got here." He paused and then added, his voice suddenly thick, "JD, I'm sorry you didn't get a chance to say goodbye."

"No!" I shrieked. I felt an inexplicable rage as I glared at him. "You're lying! She's not dead. How could you lie about something like that? You're horrible! You're lying!" Dr Cox jumped up and placed his hands on my shoulders, holding me against the mattress as I tried to lash out in my blind fury. After a few minutes of struggling and screaming at Dr Cox, my voice faded and I started shaking my head. At this, I was let up from the pillows and wrapped in Dr Cox's arms.

"Why her?" I asked and even to me, my voice sounded hollow. "Why not anyone else? Surely there are other people more ready to die. Couldn't he – couldn't He take someone else? Anyone else? Not her, she doesn't deserve it." I fell into silent prayers, asking God to bring Lily back no matter the cost. I would do anything to give her the chance to go to the prom and play high school softball and get married and have her own family. Anything.

She was gone. The person whose bright love of life had been my strongest motivation to fight for my own life back. The little girl who I had comforted and loved like my own child. Lily, my best friend in this new life without memories, was dead. Uncontrollable sobs tried to push their way through my constricted throat but I did everything I could to keep them quiet and inside. Still, I clung tightly to Dr Cox, resting my head on his shoulder as the sweeping depression coursed through me.

It felt like it was hours and hours later when I finally stilled and felt a sense of control over my body again, but it couldn't have been because the sky was still dark outside. Dr Cox slipped back down into his chair, brushing his hands over his face again, and watched me as I sat in silence, staring at the foot of my bed. I could see her standing there, as bright and cheerful as she had been the day she'd arrived at the hospital. I couldn't remember our first meeting but I was sure she had looked like this. There was no paleness, no muscle spasms, no pain in her eyes. Just her smile.

"She's gone," I said and my voice was not hollow and empty but calm, if unsteady. "She's really gone."

"She's in a better place," Dr Cox said. I knew he didn't actually believe in religion or heaven but he had said it to comfort me. And maybe to comfort himself. Anyone would want to think that Lily had gone to a more beautiful place.

 _Have fun in heaven, Lily,_  I said in my mind to the image at the foot of my bed. Judging by the expression I saw on Dr Cox's face out of the corner of my eye, I think I might've said it out loud too.  _I hope it's full of fluffy kittens and oreo milkshakes and an Olympic stadium for you to play softball and a lot of handsome guys who will dance with you while you're dressed up like a princess._

Lily answered in my head, still smiling.  _I'll keep an eye on you and make sure you are always happy like you always made me happy. Thanks for everything. Tell everyone I said thanks and bye, especially Mr Grumpy-pants._ At this, she gestured at Dr Cox, who was watching me curiously as I gave a small smile, still staring at the space at the end of my bed.  _He loves you JD, don't ever let him convince you otherwise._ I nodded and blinked back another round of tears.  _You were my best friend JD. I love you._

"I love you too," I whispered. Lily smiled and waved at me. I lifted a hand in a small wave and murmured, "Bye, Lily." I blinked and she was gone. "Bye," I repeated and I heard Dr Cox mutter a quiet, "Take care, kiddo," while looking in the direction I was staring. I turned to him and gave a sad smile. "She'll be happy up there," I said certainly. "She deserves the best piece of heaven and more."

"Hear, hear," Dr Cox said in agreement, nodding his head, and we sat in a companionable silence of mourning until the sun finally crested the horizon.


	15. His Promise-Keeping

_Promises are a special sort of thing that a lot of us really take for granted. We promise our wife we'll clean out the garage, or our parents that we'll call more often. We promise our little kids that we will be around forever to chase monsters out of their closets and stop them from ever getting hurt. There are a lot of promises we make that we either don't intend to keep or that we just can't. But every once in a while, you make a promise that you have to honour, no matter how uncomfortable it might make you. Because you have to. You promised._

Five days. That would make this day twenty-four of Newbie's stay in Sacred Heart. Could it be true the kid had been here nearly a month? Good thing being a doctor here got him pretty decent medical insurance or he'd be looking at a med-school-student-loans worth of hospital bills for when he got out of here. At the moment, though, I was positive that bills were the furthest thing from his mind.

"You got that there, Anna?" I asked, watching the kid trying to slip his arm through the sleeve of a black blazer. Newbie grunted and gave a small nod, shrugging the jacket into place. That was how the majority of the answers I had gotten from him had been for the last five days; few to no words at all. He was an emotional lockdown, his expression stoic and eyes distant. He didn't get angry, he didn't cry, he didn't talk. It was, unfortunately, oddly reminiscent.

I shifted uncomfortably in my suit, sliding the knot in the tie that Carla had tightened around my neck back down to my chest. I hadn't wanted it tightened to begin with but she was insisting I needed to look good. It wasn't like I wouldn't fix it later, it was just making it extremely hard to breathe right now. I was already having a difficult time keeping my breathing steady as it was. When had I stepped into an alternate reality where Newbie was the emotional cripple and I was the girl?  _I need a scotch_.

"You ready to go then?" I asked, glancing at my watch. Newbie nodded, not looking at me. He was dressed as well as could be managed in his condition; a crisp white tee-shirt, sports jacket, and a pair of black exercise pants that buttoned up the sides so we could arrange them around the cast on his leg. The bandages had finally been taken off his head yesterday and Carla had come in to comb his rather mangy hair into a way where the stitches and staples wouldn't be as visible. You could still see them if you knew where to look because the hair was thinner from being shaved off, but it would do.

Without another word, I stepped up behind the wheelchair and we headed out to the elevator. I felt the eyes on us as we went but, in my typical fashion, I ignored them. The one intern that seemed to be getting close to us got growled at, surprisingly not by me, and quickly scurried off. Turk gave me an encouraging smile, presumably showing it to me because Newbie was staring straight ahead and wouldn't look at anyone. Carla nodded, her eyes a little misty, and then mimed fixing a tie. I only rolled my eyes in response.

The car ride was silent. Newbie stared out the window, his forehead resting on the glass and his expression still unmoving. A few times I tentatively tried to start a conversation with something along the lines of, "You okay there, Janet?" but got nothing more than a grunted affirmation or a jerk of the head I assumed was a nod. Getting anxious, I flipped the radio on; when it began instantly keening a slow, mournful ballad about death I hastily shut it off before it could do more damage.

And then we were there. It was a quaint little place, green and bright and fresh despite being mid-autumn. The trees were colourful streaks of orange and red against the clear slate of blue sky. I liked to think that the area had spruced itself up just for this. Just for her. _Damn, I'm getting sentimental._ Hopefully this role reversal thing would end before I started braiding my hair and fussing over lace panties. I had to choke back the scoffing noise I nearly made at this.

I unfolded the wheelchair from the back of my Porsche and helped the still-blank-faced Newbie into it. A few people gave us odd looks as we cut a line across the grass, but then I spotted a familiar face standing at the front line of chairs that gave us a sad smile filled with gratitude for being there. She gestured us toward the row of chairs and I settled Newbie's chair beside the end of the front row. I had turned on my heel to stand somewhere in the back and out of the way of the family, but a slim hand latched around my wrist and stopped me. When I looked down I found the owner still looking forward into space silently, but the slightest tremor in his slowly blinking eyes made me turn around and plant myself in the chair beside him. He couldn't say it but he needed me there, and for this, I would indulge him. Before anyone got a chance to talk to us, a man in a clerical robe stepped up to a small podium and all of the black-clad people bustled to get seated.

I had a hard time listening to the service. I felt extremely out of place being up there but I tried to reason with myself that, emotional needs aside, I had to stay with Newbie anyway. I was his doctor and he was technically out of the hospital long before it was medically safe. When I had told Gandhi to find the clothes for Newbie I had expected to hear that argument from someone, if not Baldy then from either Barbie or Carla, but for once, a little disturbingly if you ask me, we were all thinking the same thing: Newbie needed this.

Getting alarmed at the detached look on Newbie's face, I decided to focus on something else. After panning over the crowd of grim-faced people and the solemn but unemotional priest, my eyes settled on the white rectangular box. It was a beautiful piece of art for being something so gruesome. Made of clean corners and polished silver trimming, I think it was meant to be an image of purity and innocence. I, on the other hand, was having a very difficult time imagining a coffin as innocent. It was a death box, a trap that kept life and beauty hidden beneath its surface and under the ground. That pure little pine case was going to be holding her for the rest of time when she should be in the arms of the people who loved her. No, nothing innocent about a coffin.

The priest had moved aside now and I saw Mrs Marks standing at the podium. Her face was flushed, her eyes swollen, and she was clutching a cloth handkerchief in a vice-like grip as she cleared her throat. "Lily was a gift from God," she started out in a shaking voice. "I never thought I would be able to have a child, but then she came along and she was the most perfect thing I had ever seen. We loved her. Everyone loved her."

I tilted my head down, not able to listen to this anymore. A thick lump had risen into my throat and my chest felt as if it were being crushed inward. Feeling my eyes burn, I closed them and gripped my hands together in my lap until I felt the sensation pass. I wasn't going to get emotional, damned alternate reality or not.

A few minutes later her mother had stopped talking, heading back for her seat with her square of cloth pressed to her face as she openly cried. The priest approached the stand again. "If there is anyone else who would like to say a word you may do so now," he announced and then moved aside again, stationing himself a couple feet away. A line of various relatives tottered up, gabbling about remembering little things from her youth like birthday parties and bike rides. A boy who was apparently Lily's best friend from school had talked about how they had met in kindergarten and that he instantly knew how "totally awesome" she was and the ways they had helped each other while growing up. When he was reduced to tears, he escaped back into the arms of his mother and the podium was empty for a second.

The priest was looking around patiently, waiting to see if anyone else would approach. When no one else stood, he returned to the stand and said a prayer followed by a moment of silence. Then we all watched as that little white box was lowered into the dark hole. After a moment her mother walked forward, a wide, bright sunflower clutched in her hand, and stood at the edge of the grave. She seemed to be whispering to herself, then took a deep breath and dropped the flower into the hole. Another young woman, who looked like she might have been her sister, tossed in a similar flower and then escorted the grieving mother away.

As Lily's father was approaching the grave, Mrs Marks came toward us. Wordlessly, she handed a flower to us both and then wandered off with her companion. A few more people, presumably the close family as well as the best friend, tossed in their own flowers and the crowd headed to their cars. Eventually, only Newbie and I were sitting at the gravesite, still holding the flowers and not moving. I knew what I needed to do, I just couldn't do it.

_Promise you'll talk to him. For me?_

"I'm gonna miss her," I said, heaving a sigh and leaning back into the hard chair. "She – she was a good kid. You don't meet a whole lot like her." A slight head jerk was the response. "These last few days have been so different without her there. I got so used to her always being there that I never really prepared myself for when she would be gone. I never expected her to go so fast like that. I – I can't imagine what it's like for you now. You two were always together." No reaction but I saw something flicker in those vacant eyes. My God, this kid could be stubborn when he wanted to. "Newbie, I know you're trying not to but you really need to let it out."

"I did."

That was the closest I'd gotten to a real answer in five days. Regardless, the fact that it was a lie made it into a hollow victory. "A little temper tantrum the night it happened doesn't count, kid," I informed him bluntly. I knew well enough being nice wasn't the easiest way to break him down and besides, I was better at this. "I know how much she meant to you, you can't tell me the only mourning she deserves is a half-asleep hissy fit." His shoulders stiffened at this. Finally, a real reaction. I folded my arms on my chest, readying to go in for the final blow. "Real show of gratitude there, Christina."

Newbie growled and when I glanced over he was finally looking at me, his eyes flashing and his jaw set. "Don't you dare accuse me of not being grateful," he said in a dangerously low voice. I simply raised an eyebrow, silently challenging him to prove me wrong. "I had lost everything when Lily showed up. She spent her every minute stopping me from dwelling on the fact that I have no life anymore. It's why I did everything I possibly could to return the favour, to keep her happy. We both had lost our lives but I had a chance to get mine back, and she wanted me to even though she was still going to lose hers. I know that you don't find compassion like that anywhere. You know, there were days I just wanted to give up. Just turn up my morphine drip and not have to worry about all this anymore. But then every time that happened, she was there to remind me of all the good things that I had to come back for. It was like she had this sixth sense for when I was giving up."

This startled me a little more than I wanted to let on - I knew the kid was having a hard time but I didn't picture him doing something that drastic - so I had to cover it with humour. "You do know that I'm gonna have to keep you on permanent watch now," I said casually.

"Don't bother, I won't do it," Newbie said and shrugged. "After everything she did, it'd be disrespectful to her memory to give up. Besides, Lily or not, I can't do that to Sammy." Inwardly, I was sighing in relief. Suicidal Newbie actually scared me. There was a long silence again and we both seemed to be wrapped up in our own thoughts. "I'm gonna miss her."

"I know, Newbie." Silence. Apparently this was not going to work on getting the kid to crack. Figures Newbie would have to be obstinate and complicated about it. Most days he was ready to pour out his every emotion to me, but since his accident he'd been getting more and more closed off. Fine, time to go the roundabout way. "You wanna talk about somethin' else?"

"Please?"

"How you holding up without the morphine?" I asked. We'd had to take him off the drip when we'd left the hospital, so he was surviving on only what was left in his system. I had a small syringe of it in the inside pocket of my jacket but we were trying to avoid using it since giving it off hospital grounds was technically illegal. Not that I was that concerned, but Newbie had always been a little less rebellious than me and more afraid of the cops, even without memory of being such a puss.

"Alright," Newbie said with a shallow shrug. "I'll be okay a little longer, it's just a little achy now. And my head itches."

"That's good, means it's healing. You know it really – Britney, no scratching!" Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the kid abruptly lowering his hand back to his lap, the surprised look on his face as he stared at it showing he probably hadn't realised he'd lifted it in the first place. The guy has the willpower and attention span of a two-year-old, honestly. "As I was saying," I started over, stressing the words to show my annoyance, "those stitches actually look like they're doing good. You're a pretty fast healer there, Judy."

"Yeah, everywhere but my brain," Newbie said grimly.

"You'll get there." Newbie shrugged wordlessly. "You know, Martha, you're certainly a lot less whiny since your accident."

"Am I?" Newbie asked with forced interest. "That's a good thing, isn't it?"

"Well, yeah, ya know, it actually is," I answered, pouring the sarcasm back on again. "Makes my life a  _helluva_  lot easier, lemme tell ya. Listening to you whine like a teenage girl who just found out their boy band crush is gay, well, it's certainly  _nawt_  my favourite pastime." I saw Newbie give a half-smile like he was trying to hide his amusement. When had my rants and insults become amusing to him? Oh, right, since the accident because he now no longer knew I was the man he'd looked up to and that I was purposely trying to degrade his self-esteem. Damn. "But you know, you're also a lot more negative and that's not too great for your healing, especially not the healing inside your head."

Newbie scoffed. "Sorry, but it's a little bit difficult to be positive right now," he said derisively. "It's been a month and I'm still just as clueless as when I woke up, and I even forget details of my life I've already remembered. I have to spend every minute of every day trapped in that insane-asylum-white room. I have a son who's not even a year old yet and I know  _nothing_  about his life so far. I have to spend every day pretending that I am still optimistic because it's what everyone seems to expect from me even while I feel far from it because after all they've done for me, I know I have to do something to repay them and my being optimistic seems to give them hope. In the entire month I've been there I haven't heard a single word from any of my family. And to top it all off, the person who was the greatest at making me feel normal and healthy and  _happy_  is lying dead in that hole."

As I stared at his face, his eyes were locked on that dark, rectangular chasm in the ground. There was a faint watery sheen covering his eyes and, although his lips were pressed firmly together, I could see that his chin was trembling. Here it was, we'd come full circle, back to what I really wanted him to talk about. Of course, after hearing his rant I was having a pretty hard time keeping my focus, having gotten a bit of insight into Newbie's head and not expecting to find what I did. Before I could comment on anything, the kid seemed to have spurred up his own anger again.

"So I'm sorry if I'm not exactly holding my breath for a miracle," he spat. "I'm sorry that I can't just suck it up and be okay with the fact that my entire life has been ripped out from under me. But God damn it, Perry, I'd like to see you do it."

"I couldn't." The admission left me before I'd even given it any thought. My voice had been completely flat and serious as I said it, and the kid turned wide eyes on me with a look of pure shock on his face. It took a second to process what I'd said myself but once I did, I didn't take it back. It may have been out-of-the-blue, as well as uncharacteristically understanding from a guy like me, but that didn't change the fact that it was true.

"I couldn't do it," I said again, this time more firmly. "I wouldn't have lasted this long, that's for damn sure. And I'm proud of you, I really am. But you know, there are reasons for a lot of those things you said. You're stuck in that hospital room because you're still recovering from, you know, the almost dying thing. And the reason your family hasn't come by is because we don't have any numbers for them at the hospital because you neglected to put them on your files since you've never gotten on too well with them, although if you want I'll see if there's somewhere else we can look them up.

"And the reason your friends all want to see you happy is because that's how you always were before and they want to think you're going to recover just as much as you do. Before this all, you were the unshakeable one. The rest of us, we all had problems, but you were the one who was always there patching things back together. You saved Barbie every time she was collapsing like her many relationships and you helped Carla and Gandhi fix their marriage. And even me, you've helped me repair things with Jordan and coping with Ben's death. In the end, we're so used to you taking care of us that we don't know how to handle it now that the tables have turned 'round on us. And because, honest to God truth, Peggy, as selfish as it is, none of us can deal with the fact that the one who's always saved us is the one needing saving and we are completely helpless to do that."

There was an unreadable expression in JD's eyes as he stared at me, the seconds pulling by while he seemed to be thinking over my words. I stopped myself from shifting in my chair, well aware of the fact that I had not only bared a whole lot of personal emotions and fears but also had somehow grouped myself in with the kid's friends despite having spent years denying that to everyone, including myself. I was doing it for Lily. That was what I needed to remind myself. For Lily...for Lily...for Lily...  _Really?_ Yes, damn it, this is only because I promised Lily.

The expression on Newbie's face flickered but didn't become any more readable. Finally, "Who are you?"

"Why, Newbie, I'm Jesus H. Cox."

Newbie gave the slightest sign of a smile. "Not what I meant and you know it."

This was it, the moment to say that word I always deny. Stupid M-word. There was no one here to hold it over me and maybe it would help the kid's memory in the end. If there was one thing he had always been fixed on, it was as claiming me as his – _you know_. Here goes nothing. "I'm your boss."  _God damn it, Perry, you chicken ass coward._

"You sure seem to know a lot about me," Newbie remarked with a furrowed brow, heavy on the scepticism and suspicion. Alright, second chance, just say it.

"It's been almost eight years, Wanda, I was bound to learn  _something_  about you in that time even though I tried my darndest to avoid that."  _Oh my God, grow a pair, you ninny. When did you become such a girl?_   "You sort of Velcro'd yourself to me from the very first day of your internship and I'll be damned if I just _can't_ get you unstuck, even now that I've moved up to spending most of my work hours locked in an office instead of actually helping people like you're supposed to do."

There was a faint frown on the kid's face as the silence settled again, but whether it was from thinking or because my insult had finally stung through that amusement barrier of his, I didn't know. "So," he started slowly, as if still thinking it over while saying it, "you were sort of like my mentor?"

And drumroll… A sudden gust of wind charged around us and I saw the kid shivering. Glancing up at the sky, I saw that the afternoon was melting into evening and we had to have been away from the hospital for nearly three hours now. Not good for his health. And an easy out.

"Alright, Bianca, your pretty silk dress just isn't made for this weather. I think it's time to get you back," I said, standing up. It was only then I remembered the flowers Mrs Marks had given Newbie and I, although mine looked a little worse for wear since I think I may have closed my fist around it too tightly a time or two. "You've definitely been out of the loony bin for too long, you're getting delusional." I pushed the wheelchair toward the grave while I watched Newbie fingering the flower. We stopped and he leant forward to peer into the hole. At the bottom was the glossy white box, partially shadowed by the nearly-black earthen walls. A scattered pile of bright yellow flowers glowed up with all of the life and vitality that Lily had once possessed. Yeah, sunflowers were definitely the best flower to represent her.  _Dear God, you're getting sentimental again, ya girl._

"Be good up there, Lily," I murmured and then tossed the flower. I watched as it landed, making the other flowers bounce and shift as well. A few seconds later, Newbie lifted his own flower, rubbing one of the silky petals beneath his fingers. He plucked it off, tucking it into the pocket of his jacket, and then threw the rest of the flower down to join the others.

"Thanks," was all he said.

And as we headed for the car, I felt like there was a lot less pressure on my conscience. I had talked to the kid, or at least given it the best effort I'd ever given. Either way, even though I still hadn't been able to own up to my position in the kid's mind, I felt like we had reached a different sort of understanding. And inside, I was killing myself for doing exactly what I knew was for the worst by letting the kid get close to me and letting myself show him that I might care just a tiny, insignificant little bit about him.  _Thanks a load, Lils._  Her promise had made me put both myself and the kid in a position where at least one if not both of us was going to end up getting hurt.  _I sure hope you know what you've done here, li'l miss. 'Cause it's you I'm gonna blame when this all inevitably goes wrong._


	16. My Lifeline

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A JD Chapter.

_When things go bad, you always need something to keep you grounded. Having something or someone to keep you focused on reality stops you from spiralling off course whenever life pulls a fast one on you. We all have support systems - family and friends who protect us and help us up - but I'm talking about a real lifeline. That one thing that you may not always reach for in the little things, but when something completely unexpected knocks you off your feet it's the first thing you reach for and cling to with everything you have._

Despite having just gotten back from the funeral of a little girl, I felt better than I had in days. Don't get me wrong, I was still horribly depressed about Lily's death, but I didn't feel quite as lost as I had before. Spending more time in the hospital without Lily would be hard and I knew I was going to have a difficult time dealing with it, but at the same time, I knew there was something else there for me now: Dr Cox.

Having him open up to me the way he did was remarkable, especially since I had been told how he always blew off people who tried to get into his head. And I believed it all too because that was just his personality. He didn't talk about his feelings much at all. I could understand that; I had gotten a little uncomfortable with it, too. Then while we were sitting alone in the middle of that graveyard he spilt it all. Well, maybe not _all_ of it but he did make an attempt, and that made me feel better than anything else possibly could have. Gaining some sort of closeness with the man who my memories seemed so attached to was a welcoming comfort.

Now we were back to the hospital and I was actually grateful. Not just because I finally felt like I had dealt with my grief over Lily but because I wasn't physically feeling so hot. I was freezing even though I was wearing a real shirt and a bulky sports jacket, not to mention pants for the first time in a month. My leg and ribs and head were all starting to pound now that the morphine was wearing off - I had pretended not to feel the pain so Dr Cox wouldn't illegally inject me off hospital grounds - and there was an uncomfortable fluttery feeling in my chest that made me feel like my heart was doing some rhythmless cha-cha against my lungs.

Just as we were reaching my room, Dr Cox's phone rang (playing Star Wars, how cool is that?) and he answered it with a snapped, "What?" I just grinned, knowing who it was. He and Jordan sure were a crazy couple but there was something pretty comforting in knowing that sometimes when he was acting like an ass it was out of affection. It managed to transform an irate, insult-ridden rant into a sort of paternal lecture filled with hidden fondness and genuine concern. He would always deny it but I knew it was true.

"And pray tell me, oh darling of mine, why oh _why_ you waited until this very second to tell me?" Dr Cox asked into the phone with an impressive amount of sarcasm. He apparently wasn't pleased with her answer because he slipped into a scowl. "Alright, alright, fine. You owe me, though." A smile again. "I'm holding you to that." One of those laughs where he tried to hide the fact he's amused. "God, you are terrible." Another laugh and he closed the phone.

"Jordan again?" I asked, already knowing the answer but wanting to get him talking again. We hadn't spoken much on the drive back, mostly because I didn't want him to notice that my teeth were chattering.

"Yeah," he answered and poked his head out into the hall. He whistled that surprisingly sharp whistle of his that sounded like you were being physically slapped in the ear. Where did he learn to do that? "You, come," he shouted at someone in the hall and a moment later, a visibly shaking intern scurried into the room.

"Yes, Dr Cox?" he asked in a wavering voice.

Ignoring him, Dr Cox turned back to me. "Well, the Banshee Queen only just now decided to inform me that in five minutes I am supposed to be getting the kids from her and taking them to the sitter while she's off to try and beautify her mottled green self along with her minion witches, so I've got to go. Tremors here," he pointed to the intern, "is going to get you situated back in your bed and will have you settled and comfortable by the time I get back in thirty minutes. Right, Tremors?"

"Uh, my name's Trevor," the intern offered awkwardly. Dr Cox growled and Trevor instantly, albeit exasperatedly, said, "Yes, sir."

"Better," Dr Cox said with a mocking smile. "One half-hour. Try not to kill him, m'kay? We're finally getting to the point where I might be able to turf him outta this place for someone else to deal with." As the intern nodded, Dr Cox and I exchanged grins and then he stepped out into the hall.

The intern called in an orderly and they helped me into my bed, Trevor apologising profusely every time I winced when they pressed against my ribs. They made me get rid of the jacket but I was grateful when they let me stay in the shirt and pants for now. I was still freezing and wanted the extra warmth, if nothing else. First thing the intern did was replace my morphine drip - and I was relieved to see that without Dr Cox in the room his hands were less shaky so I only got poked twice - and then he reattached me to all of the electronic monitors.

The first thing both of us noticed was my spiked temperature. He flinched at contact with my skin, hissing the word, "burning," before glancing at the monitor. The temperature read at 101 degrees Fahrenheit. Then both of our eyes travelled up to the jagged line representing my heartbeat. It looked uneven and sporadic in most places, some beats stronger and others way too weak, while the space between the beats varied to an alarming degree.

"Not good," the intern murmured under his breath. Had I not already known this, I would have been frightened by hearing my doctor say that. "Alright, I'm gonna go get some medication for you and I'll be right back." Trevor scooted out of the room, mumbling something that sounded like slurs against Dr Cox taking me out of the hospital while I was still sick and how the Chief of Medicine abused his power. I only laughed at this. It wasn't like the guy knew the whole story, he was just a worried newbie. Probably afraid I was gonna kick the bucket while Cox was gone and then he'd get his head ripped out his ass. I was just shuddering out of that disturbing mental image when the intern returned with a glass of water and a smaller plastic cup with three little white pills.

"That was fast," I remarked with faint amusement, trying to start conversation.

Trevor smiled thinly as he handed me the two cups. "Take these," he said. "One to take down your fever and the other two should ease up that arrhythmia." Apparently the guy was still too afraid of me dying to bother with small talk. Or maybe he just didn't appreciate my sarcasm since it had actually taken him almost ten minutes. Rolling my eyes either way, I obediently downed the pills and drained the water. God, I hate taking pills. Trevor took the empty cups from me and then stepped out into the hall again, but he never made it farther than the nurses' station, where he leant against the counter and pretended like he wasn't watching my room.

Giving him up as a lost cause, I turned on the television and settled back. Carla stepped into the room only a minute later.

"Hey, Bambi, how are you?" she asked in that soft mother voice she always seemed to adopt around me.

"I'm fine," I was able to say and sincerely mean it. I was sad but not devastatingly so. I knew I'd be okay.

Carla set her hand on my upper arm and then flinched back in the same way Trevor had. "You feel warm," she commented and her eyes turned to the monitors.

"They already gave me medicine for it," I assured her hastily before she went into mother bear mode. Mother hen was tolerable but mother bear was when she got murderous. "It's nothing big, I'm okay."

She looked unconvinced as she pursed her lips but her eyes were soft as she brushed a few loose strands of hair off my forehead. Her fingers felt cool and refreshing against my skin. "I'm gonna come back in ten minutes and check on you, just to be sure," she said. "And Turk will come up and see you once he gets out of surgery, but he's in the middle of a heart valve transplant so it could be a while."

"That's okay, I get it," I said with a shrug, smiling. My throat stuck and I cleared it, trying not to show my grimace as the motion hurt my ribs again. "Besides," I continued, "Dr Cox'll be back any minute now. I can keep myself occupied for five minutes, don't worry." Carla smiled gently and pressed a light kiss to my forehead before walking back out to the nurses' station. I turned my attention back to the television but had only been watching for about three minutes when Dr Cox appeared in the doorway, shaking his head.

"Crazy she-beast," he muttered to himself, crossing the room to drop into the chair by my bed. He had already ditched his tie, I noticed. For the best, really; he was toying with it the entire time we were at the funeral. "Why on earth she couldn't drop the kids off herself I will never know. I think she just likes driving me insane."

"Probably," I agreed with a one-shouldered shrug. I turned off the television again, knowing there would be nothing good on that I could watch without Dr Cox ridiculing me. About the only show we could watch together in peace, surprisingly, was Days of Our Lives, and it actually shocked me just how well he seemed to follow what was going on. It was almost like he watched it regularly. I pondered this possibility for a while but found it just a little too abstract to picture Dr Cox sitting around watching a soap opera.

I was envisioning him crying into a tissue about some twisted love triangle and how their love was just never meant to be when that piercing whistle stirred me awake again. "Welcome back to earth, Dolly Daydream," he said with a raised eyebrow. Oops, I was still grinning like an idiot about that last fantasy. "I asked how you were feelin'?"

"Oh–" I blushed when my voice cracked and I cleared my throat to try again. "Better," I said. Okay, so it was sort of a lie. The pain in my leg and head had faded thanks to that beautiful morphine slipping through my veins but my chest was stinging. I was still freezing and, for some reason, my throat had gotten itchy.

"Good," Dr Cox said, relaxing back into his chair and propping his feet on the corner of the bed again. "I'm surprised that incompetent Neanderthal actually managed to do something right and  _nawt_  kill you while I was gone. Not that I would've complained, honestly, but…"

I knew he wasn't really surprised. He wouldn't have entrusted the guy with a job if he hadn't known he was capable of doing it. Vintage Cox. I gave a quiet chuckle at this but the laugh turned into a cough. Tears appeared in my eyes as I fought to control the spasms that were sending pain lancing through my ribs. When my breathing eventually returned to normal, if shallow, I saw Dr Cox standing over me.

"Y'alright there, Newbie?"

I tried to answer but my throat felt tight so I nodded instead. After swallowing a few times, I managed, "Yeah," in a hoarse voice. "Choked."

"Choked on air?" Dr Cox asked sceptically, his eyebrows raised. His expression was amused but there was something contrasting in his eyes. "Well there, that's just special, Rosie. Ya know, most people 'round here try to  _inhale_  the air, not ingest it."

"I'll try that next time," I joked sarcastically. Holy crap, was my voice really that bad or did it just sound that way to me? Apparently not, because I saw Dr Cox's forehead wrinkle.

"You need some water there?"

I reflexively went to shake my head but then thought better of it. My throat really was starting to feel funny and maybe the water would help. "Yeah." Dr Cox nodded and stepped out into the hall. While he was gone, I took the time to slow and steady my breathing because my chest was starting to feel strange too. When he came back with another paper cup in hand, he offered it to me and I took a tentative sip. My throat seemed to not be listening to me anymore and I choked on the thankfully small amount of water. It was enough to send me into another fit of coughing that made my side scream in protest and my hand crushed around the cup, spilling water over my fingers and into my lap.

"Newbie?" Dr Cox asked, helping me sit up and rubbing his hand over my back roughly. I answered with a pained gasp in between coughs. My stomach suddenly seized and the cramping washed another round of pain through me, but also brought a realisation.

My free hand flew out to latch onto Dr Cox's forearm. "Ana," I wheezed out. Through squinted eyes, I saw him lean closer to hear me. "Ana - flax."

"Anaflax?" Dr Cox asked in confusion and then it clicked. "Anaphylactic." As he said this, I tasted copper in my mouth and felt stickiness on my lips. My head was pounding to the point where I could barely understand what Dr Cox was shouting. The pain that surged through me at every failed attempt at breathing was the only thing that kept me from slipping away. I caught a few random words he said: "Nurse…crashing…bronchial oedema…epinephrine…intubate…"

The snatches were getting harder to keep track of as darkness pressed on my eyes even though I was sure they were still open. There was a sharp, quick sting in my arm. I could feel myself being touched dozens of places and pressure where my body was being forced to lay flat on the bed. It was easier to do now because I could no longer get enough air in to make me cough. There were fingers on my lips, forcing them apart, and then I tasted something cold and metallic. More shouting and then the thing was gone. Instead, there was pain at the front of my neck and a very uncomfortable feeling of pushing against my already stiff throat.

And then, miraculously, there was air in my lungs. I knew I wasn't pulling it in there myself but it was there. Of course, I immediately wished it was gone again because the burning sensation that spread through my ribs was excruciated. My body instinctively twitched and a strangled noise vibrated up through my chest, although I wasn't sure if it actually managed to escape me. It wouldn't have been heard over the shouting around me anyway.

I wasn't aware of anything but the pain. Everywhere seemed to hurt, or at least those places that didn't were being overpowered by the parts that were. I felt like I was drowning but also electrocuted at the same time. I couldn't take it anymore. It was too much.

And then I felt a hand rest against my sweaty forehead. It was an unfamiliar touch but the hand was large and calming. A broad thumb was brushing a small circle over the bridge of my nose, an action that I found extremely relaxing. A voice was at my ear, talking to me in a frantic but oddly soothing tone, but I couldn't get a hold of the words. There was too much pressure in my head and on my chest. Instead, I focused on the hand and I clung to it like it was the only thing keeping me alive. And I knew that, in a way, it was.


	17. His Flash-Bang Rage

_Anger is a funny thing. Sometimes anger isn't even really anger at all, but other emotions being disguised as something easier to cope with. Everyone has their own way to deal with anger, be it venting it out of their system or drinking till it becomes something happier or burning it out in aggression and violence. But on top of that anger, there is that anger that is a genuine rage, and when you climax in that you find that area where everything seems to disappear and you blow up like a military grade flash-bang grenade: a blinding light and then that earth-shaking boom that could actually blast the muffins out of Bobbo's greedy death grip._

Maintaining my composure at the time was one of the most difficult things I had ever attempted. I had to do it, there were people watching. My reputation had been damaged enough already in the past month. I was not going to jeopardise it worse. I was sure that the fact I had run down here practically stroking the kid like a puppy, with a look of terror on my face that I had only half been able to hide, was already circulating in the hospital's gossip rings. Damn Newbie, this was his fault.

Despite my overwhelming desire to be pacing a hole in the floor of the corridor, I stayed standing perfectly still. My feet were planted apart and my hands were tucked deep into the pockets of my slacks, my expression one of blank seriousness as I stared vacantly ahead. The fact that my hands were tinted scarlet and that there were brilliantly crimson spots shining against the fabric of my dress shirt went completely ignored. As was the growing compulsion to express myself in the only way I could: through destructive anger and the haze of alcohol.

The sheet of Plexiglas in front of me made me feel like I was on display. I knew it was exactly the opposite since the people on the other side were paying me no heed while my attention was fixated on them. Still, I felt like I was in a cage and on the other side of the glass was the entire world, watching as I fought to keep myself in control. It was normally not this difficult. I hadn't even been this unstable the last time I had looked through this glass onto a very similar scene less than a month ago, even with the guilt and horror riding on my chest. This time was infinitely worse and I knew why. Because this time I couldn't deny the fact that I was terrified. Or that I cared. Damn Newbie, all his fault.

As hard as I had tried to prevent it, in this last month things changed. I hated change. Life had been easy and comfortable before, everything typical and tolerable in its normality. I had worked to keep things that way but somehow the scales had tipped. Even while I was pushing the kid away to protect him, and me, I had found myself slowly growing more attached to him. The irony of it all was that while Newbie still could not remember me and the memories of our last seven years together were missing, we were undoubtedly closer than ever before.

I had gotten soft. That was all there was to it. It had started with Jack, multiplied with Jennifer, and then another stupid kid with a J name had pushed his way in too. I had tried to keep him at arm's length –  _did you, really?_  – but somehow he had managed to worm through my defences. And now I was paying for it.

I had let myself get close to someone, and now I was standing outside the Operating Room waiting for the verdict.

My eyes were still trained on the centre of the room where the surgeons were clustered around a figure draped in green operation blankets, streaked with that stunning red that seemed to glow off anything it touched. Why was it always so unnaturally bright? It was a deceptively cheery colour, so dazzlingly lively and yet so ominously frightening. The body was completely shrouded and beyond my vision, but I could see that open cavity of the chest they were carving into like a Thanksgiving turkey. And for the first time since my internship, I actually felt nauseous at a medical procedure.

Finally I couldn't take it any longer. I turned so quick I nearly stumbled and set off down the halls. People all looked away and stepped out of my path as I went and it was a good thing because I might have committed murder if someone hindered me at the moment. I found myself at a familiar room and when I walked in, I mercifully found it empty. So I released my tension in a way I hadn't done in a while now.

Nothing was more relaxing to me than hearing the tinkling sound of glass shattering against the plaster wall, or the crunch of a monitor frame splitting through, or the heavy thunk of tables being upended. A rolling chair broke the door off a cabinet, sending a barrage of cylinders raining down onto the linoleum like icicles. A keyboard exploded with the force that it was brought down onto the corner of a counter. A microscope landing on a computer sent chips and gears flying in every direction.

Red-faced and panting with the strain, I leant against the closed door and examined the destroyed remnants of the tech lab. It had been a few years since I had done this and a small sense of satisfaction filled me to know that I still had it in me. Take that, old age. I had refrained from breaking through any of the windows or doors simply because it was still visiting hours, meaning that the possibility of me hitting someone on the other side and causing a lawsuit was much higher. But overall, I felt steadier now that I had burned off so much anger and fear, so I was scowling slightly less as I stepped out into the hall.

"What did you-?" I was greeted by the slack-jawed techie who seemed to hibernate in that room. He was new - the old techie who was used to my doing this had had a complete mental breakdown the previous year and been found running around the car park naked, hugging a microscope and singing Sound of Music at the top of his lungs, and had consequently been carted off to a fluffy padded cell - and clearly horrified by the damage. "That equipment is vital. It needs to be replaced and functioning, now."

"Wayner," I said firmly, jerking him out of his mini freak-out. "It'll be replaced by tomorrow."

"Yeah, so what am I supposed to do for the rest of the day?" Wayner asked, half-hysterical.

I pretended to think about it. "How about, oh I dunno, go home and iron the twists out of your panties?" I suggested with heavy sarcasm. When he didn't budge, I scowled and crossed my arms over my chest. "I mean it, Whiner,  _ga-het_ yourself outta my face." The techie glared at me and then, with a noise of disgust, he blew past me, bumping me roughly with his shoulder as he went.

Shaking my head, I headed back to the OR. It had been an hour since I'd left so I wasn't horribly surprised to see that the room was empty when I stopped at the window. I was a little anxious, however, at the thought that the reason it was now empty was not a good one. The lead surgeon spotted me and came over quickly. "He's still hanging in there," he said and I gave a curt nod, touching my nose with my thumb and crossing my arms again. "He's in post-op."

"Did you get him fixed?" I asked bluntly.

"Well the anaphylaxis responded to the medication and he's free of the bronchial oedema, and we've drained the fluid from his lungs," the surgeon explained. And here comes the 'but'… "However because of the seizing, his ribs were seriously moved and had to be realigned. Also, the pressure from his ribs collapsed his right lung. We were able to re-inflate it and it is working again and should be fine." He paused here and I braced myself. Oh God no, not a second round of inevitably worse 'buts'…

"Go on," I prompted sharply when he didn't speak right away.

"The medication given to him to treat his arrhythmia is what set off the allergic reaction, as we found out on pumping his stomach, but because it was not allowed to do its job his heart was still really weak. As we were closing up the surgery, he went into cardiac arrest. We saved him but now he's unresponsive. He's comatose."

I think the surgeon might have still been talking but I zoned out there. Unresponsive. Comatose. Between the stress of the previous head trauma and being cut off from oxygen for almost two minutes and his second heart failure, his brain hadn't been able to hack it any longer. It didn't take my superior intelligence to realise that the chances of coming out of this coma were a lot slimmer than last time. This time, I may very well have lost Newbie for good.

No, no, not this way. This can't be how Newbie goes. He wouldn't give up now. He was a stubborn, persistent little girl. That much was obvious by the fact that after years he still tailed me, expecting me to acknowledge that he was like a surrogate son to me even though I had never given any hint of complying with that inclination. Newbie was a fighter. He would come out of it.

Right now, there was something else in that information that had caught my attention and I knew where I needed to go. Without bothering to see if the surgeon actually was still talking to me, I walked away. I went up to the next floor and stood at the nurses' station until I saw my target appear at the end of the hall. Once he spotted me he tried to turn and run, but I stopped him with a whistle and approached with the purpose and attack of a bull.

"What in the  _hell_  were you thinking?" I shouted, making the intern shrink back. "What sort of moronic, incompetent, asinine imbecile are you? I leave you a patient for twenty, I repeat  _twenty,_ minutes and you still almost killed him."

"How was I supposed to know?" the intern said and I could hear the hint of defensiveness in his voice. Ooh, this one had the semblance of a backbone.

"How? Well, there are those pretty, colourful papers we hang on that clipboard at the end of the bed. Us doctors call them 'charts.' And if you had taken the time to just peruse through them you would have realised that your patient was severely allergic to the medication that you stuffed down his throat."

The intern straightened up a little. "Well, he should have said something. He's a doctor, he should know."

"He has amnesia, ya fuckin' dumbass!" I snapped, screaming at him before I could get a hold of myself.

Apparently swearing really got on this guy's case because he was quite suddenly squaring off with me, his face inches away from mine and angry. One of his hands pushed against my shoulder with a sneer. "So it's my fault that his attending took him out of the hospital all day in the middle of autumn and then brought him back horribly sick, before dashing out and tossing him off on the first intern he could find?" he snapped back bitterly. This time, his palm landed on my pectoral. I was just begging him to go for a third and see what happened, especially after what he'd said. "It must be my fault, 'cause God forbid the great Dr Jackass make a mistake. Especially when it comes to your li'l whippin' bitch, Dorian."

The second those fingertips met with my chest, the world vanished. Everything was bleached white and silent. It was hard to tell how much time had passed because time seemed to be non-existent in this place but eventually, I returned. The first thing I was aware of was the fact that my head felt like it was splitting. Then the loud noises of clustering people, which contributed to my headache. And then there was a stinging pain radiating through my hand and wrist.

Vision was the last thing to clear up and I was still standing in the middle of the hall at Sacred Heart. There were a few people gathered around, although they were still keeping their distance, and they were staring at my feet. I glanced down and saw the intern huddled in front of me with his hands clasped over his face, blood pouring between his fingers from his clearly broken nose. Growling as understanding came to me, I met the guy's watery gaze. "Internship suspended. Take a year off to learn how to read the damn charts and if you can get that down then maybe you can give this doctor thing another shot at another hospital."

I turned away, pausing to point at a nurse and then at the curled up ex-intern. She nodded and hurried over to help him up and down to the ER where he could get his face fixed up. I headed for my office, Ted falling into step beside me, scratching at the hair on one side of his head with the opposite hand. It was a completely ridiculous position that made him look like some sort of clueless ape. Of course, for Sweats that might be considered a step up.

"Uh, Dr Cox, you know he could–"

"Another word and you're joining that intern," I said. The sad excuse for a lawyer shut up instantly, wiping at the sweat on his forehead with his jacket sleeve. "He's not going to sue because he knows that he could be hit with malpractice charges for what he did and be blacklisted if this thing ends up in court. Now leave."

Ted wandered off and I managed to get to my office without any more interruption. I needed a break from all this or I was going to honestly kill someone this time. I snatched up my jacket and keys, and then dashed out to the car park while ignoring the shouts I recognised as Carla's that were aimed at me. Throwing myself into my car, I flew out of the park and made for the safety of home.


	18. His Reality Slap

_We exist under a lot of misconceptions in life. We create these little safety circles that are comprised of only what we want to see or acknowledge, usually to protect ourselves from potential harm. In doing this, we can blind ourselves to even the most obvious things. And it always takes a good slap, be it in the form of an unexpected turn of events or a blunt observation from someone else's mouth, to shatter that sphere of denial and bring us back to the real world._

I never made it home. A block and a half away from the hospital, I swerved into the car park of the bar and shut off the engine. It had been a long day and by God, I needed a drink. Or twelve. Normally I would just go home and do this, but Jack's voice saying 'Daddy dwinks a wot' was still haunting me and I knew the bar was safer. I hadn't drank as much as I intended to tonight in front of my children since then and I was not going to wreck that now. Besides, right now I just wanted to be left alone.

Slipping out my phone, I dialled a number and after a minute Jordan picked up. "Whaddya want?"

"Hey Jordan," I said, too exhausted to lay on the bitterness. "I'm just letting you know I'm not coming home tonight." When Jordan protested loudly, I launched into explaining the events and by the end, she was thoughtfully silent.

"Kid can't catch a break, can he?" she asked with a faint stab at humour. I didn't respond. "Okay, but be careful. If you die I can't raise our kids and still afford to go to the spa every weekend."

This time I actually almost smiled. "Thanks for the concern. I'll see you tomorrow."

"Perry?"

"Yeah."

"I–" A hesitant pause. "I loathe you."

A smile snuck onto my face. It may seem completely unromantic but the alternated words sounded close enough and I knew what she meant. "Loathe you too, Jor." There was a moment of peaceful silence and then the sound of the dial-tone. I closed the phone and tucked it back into the pocket of my coat.

The bar was just starting to work itself into full swing when I walked in. It looked like the typical college bars I had frequented in med school; musty air, scratched felt on the pool table, dart board with darts stuck in the wall all around it, and a retro-style jukebox in the corner that was currently playing some song that was old even when I was in high school. Clusters of people, all looking to be between twenty-five and forty, were unwinding over their beers and chatting each other up. I was grateful I still looked a few years younger than I was because it drew less attention. Thankfully I had mustered up the common sense to strip off the blood-spattered dress shirt in the car and was now wearing only my grey cotton tee. That would have attracted a lot of unwanted looks.

I sat down at a stool on the end of the bar and gestured to the bartender, who brought me five shot glasses of scotch and a beer. I grunted and instantly downed the first glass, revelling in the way it burnt down my throat. I took a swig of beer and then threw back another shot. This pattern was repeated until the drinks before me were empty, at which point I gestured to the barkeep again and they were replaced.

"Perry?"

I growled and ignored the speaker, swishing a mouthful of beer between my teeth and swallowing it.

"Perry? Wow, long time, no see. I haven't talked to you in forever! How ya been?"

Growl. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw someone slipping up onto the barstool beside me. Once again I had the barkeeper fix the lack of alcohol in front of me and I eagerly set in on making this disappear as well.

"Not speaking to me? Yeah, that's the mature way to deal with this. Good idea."

Growl. I noticed that the glasses were all empty again and looked up at the bartender. He glanced down at the line of upturned glasses and shook his head. Ugh, not what I wanted to hear. I regretfully drained down the last of the beer I'd been allotted.

"Pee-rrryy."

Yeah, because sing-song voices are always so charming and get people to be nice. Rolling my eyes, I tossed a handful of bills onto the counter and stood up, eyes widening as I stumbled slightly. Not cool. Normally that much alcohol hardly phased me, but then again it had been a long time since I'd had that much and I was pretty tired.

"You alright there?"

Grunt.

"Hey, I think that qualified as you answering me. Are we finally speaking?"

Ignoring this, I stumbled out of the bar. I couldn't drive home and, to be frank, I didn't want to go there anyway. My feet steered me in the opposite direction and I followed them without question.

"Okay fine, don't talk, but I'm not going away." Foot falls directly beside me, keeping pace. Someone seriously doesn't know how to take a hint. "I know a song that gets on everybody's nerves."  _Oh God, please no._  "Everybody's nerves, everybody's nerves."  _Please, whatever higher power there is up there, just kill me now._ "I know a song that gets on everybody's nerves, and this is how it goes."

I groaned loudly and saw a smile out of the corner of my eye.

"Ah c'mon, that's a classic!" I growled again. "Okay, how 'bout… It's a small world, after all, it's a small, small world." Louder growl. "Ooh, I know – Once more, you open the door, and you're here in my heart, and my heart will go on – "

"Now you're just being an idiot." So I hadn't meant to say anything, but someone had to shut that racket up. Honestly, that song is horrible enough on its own and that voice sounded like cat's being tortured.

"Ha, knew that would get you to talk." My steps faltered slightly as I stepped up to the hospital's automatic doors but then I swallowed and continued on. "Why are we here? I thought you were off duty." Hoping that maybe if I didn't say another word then I might get some peace, I walked into the elevator, ignoring the eyes watching my progress. The doors closed and it jerked upward. I had to grip the side rails to stop from buckling. I saw my follower reach toward me but then stop when I straightened up. As the doors slid open, I kept on to nurses' station. Pausing, I raised an eyebrow and the closest nurse instantly pointed to a room across the hall. I grunted and nodded, making my way to the door she's indicated.

"Seriously, you gonna tell me why we're here?"

I stepped into the room and my eyes fell on him. He was bleached white again, more than his natural paleness, and there were thick bandages around his bared torso. A clear tube was between his parted lips and three stitches ran across the base of his throat. There were IV stands beside the head of the bed and an array of machines whirred quietly while their wires were attached to the still figure.

" _Ooooohhhh_ , got it."

Sighing heavily, I collapsed down in the plastic chair and rubbed my hands over my face. This sight had sobered me a lot more than I wanted to be. Damn it, this was the whole reason I had  _gone_  to the bar.

"Doesn't look  _too_  bad. Not good but not horrible."

"Looks can be deceiving," I answered dully.

"You mean like how you  _look_  like you might be sane?" I glanced up. "I take that back. Bad example because you currently look very much like the not-sane that you are."

"Thanks." I straightened up in the chair and turned to the doorway. There he was, leaning casually against the doorframe with his arms folded over his chest. Same blue eyes watching me and he had that typical, goofy grin on his face despite the seriousness of the situation. "Why are you here?"

"Hmm, nice to see you too."

"I'm serious."

"I'm never serious."

"I know, Ben, that's why you're dead."

My best friend rolled his eyes. "No, Perry, I'm dead because I had cancer."

"No, you're dead because after being diagnosed with cancer you went skipping 'round the world and neglected to peek inside and check up on it in the entire year you were gone."

Ben frowned, but even that didn't seem angry. "Is this why I'm here? So I can get this lecture again? Because if so, I'm heading back upstairs to see if I can find some more lesbian action to watch."

"Lesbian action in heaven?" I asked, instantly distracted. Damn, maybe I should follow Paige's example and put some effort into gettin' into heaven.

"No, sorry, meant up to the fifth floor," Ben corrected. "I was gonna go up and see if those two lesbian gynaecologists are still here, see if I can catch them in an on-call room or something."

It took a lot of will power to not laugh, although I couldn't fight the smile. "Nah, they both quit two years ago to move to Canada so they could legally get married."

"Lame!" Ben exclaimed, looking crushed. He pouted and came over to sit on the edge of the hospital bed, swinging his legs as he watched me. "So, I'm gonna go ahead and assume that this – " he pointed at the unconscious Newbie in the bed, " – is why I'm here."

"Why, you the Angel of Death now?" I asked with a cocked eyebrow.

Ben put on an over-dramatic act of making faces and extending a hand curled like a claw toward Newbie's chest. "I am here for your ssoooouuulll," he growled out, very convincingly channelling Andre the Giant's line from  _Princess Bride._  Then in an instant, he had snapped back to normal. "Angel of Death? Seriously? You have that high of expectations for me, do ya?"

"Well I just can't think of why else my dead best friend would be hanging around a coma patient's room," I said and shrugged.

"I'm not," Ben countered. "I'm hanging around  _you_. Not my fault you brought us here."

"Fair enough." I joined my hands behind my head, resting back into them in an attempt to relieve the pounding that was building inside my skull. Didn't help much. "So why, exactly,  _are_  you hanging around me?"

Ben shrugged. "Don't ask me, I'm just the hallucination," he said nonchalantly, still swinging his legs alternately like an over-active child.

"You're helpful," I said, rolling my eyes again. Ben shrugged again, now staring at me beneath that ridiculous fringe that always seemed to be falling in his eyes. God, how could he handle that? "How did this all get so out of control?"

"What? We're just sitting here–"

"No, this mess with Newbie," I clarified, leaning forward to rest my elbows on my knees and cradle my face in my hands. "It was never supposed to get like this, Ben. I was just trying to be nice and let him get some sleep, and now look at him. Car wreck, broken bones, amnesia, nearly dies. Then I try to help him cope by letting him go to that girl's funeral. Fever, pain from lack of drugs, arrhythmia comes back. Turn my back for one second and he's in anaphylactic shock and collapses a lung, and now he's in a coma that it's very unlikely he'll come out of. I try to help him out and now he's practically dead." I groaned loudly, coming out as more of a growl of frustration, and stood up to pace the room. "You see, this is what happens when I let myself get close and care about people. Jordan and I cared about each other once, and we destroyed everything we had and it killed who both of us really were. And then there was you, who actually died. And now the kid."

"Sounds like maybe  _you're_  the Angel of Death." I stopped and looked at him. "Hmm, might be just a little too soon for jokes. You're right. I'll shut up now." Ben mimed pulling a zipper across his lips.

I sighed again and tucked my hands behind my head again. My head was really starting to pound, from the stressful day and the alcohol and now dealing with this annoying hallucination in the form of my dead best friend. "I just don't know what to do now," I confessed, lifting my gaze to meet Ben's. I was grateful to see that beneath his typical spark there was a seriousness rarely seen, and I knew he was really listening. "How do I fix this?"

"Mmmm mmm mm mhhhmm mmmmrrrm."

I reached forward and pretended to undo the zipper on his mouth. "You're an idiot," I informed him, laughing. Damn it all if Ben wasn't the greatest at lightening a situation.

Ben acted offended for a second. "As I was saying," he said in a huff, and then dropped back into a more natural tone. "First off, quit spazzing. The amount of time you spend worrying about all this is pretty unbelievable. Secondly, stop blaming yourself. All of this, not your fault. And I'm pretty sure if he was awake he'd be telling you the same thing. And thirdly, quit obsessing about this thing between you and him. You're the mentor, he's the mentee. End of story. But on top of that, he's also your friend. Hell, since I've kicked the bucket I'd say he's probably the closest you've got to a best friend."

I opened my mouth but Ben scowled and shook his head, silencing me. "Lastly, stop arguing with me, Perry. I'm a hallucination from your head, I know what's going on in there. Even if you don't want to admit these things out loud and you keep trying to push them away, they're there. I should know. So just quit being such a hard ass and accept it so we can get over this. I wanna watch some hockey before I disappear again."

Chuckling quietly, I leant up against the bed next to where Ben was sitting, crossing my arms loosely on my chest. "He's not my best friend, Ben, that was you," I said bluntly.

"I'm flattered," Ben said, batting his eyelashes. "But seriously, you can have more than one best friend in your life. Think about it. Who is the one who is most successful at cheering you up when you get all cranky?" I started to answer but Ben interrupted again. "I mean since I've died." I grumbled. "Who is the one who's there in a heartbeat if you really need someone, regardless of what he's got going on? Who is the one who takes all the crap you shovel out 'cause he knows it's just who you are and generally accepts that fact?"

I wasn't about to answer that, but it seemed I didn't need to because Ben kept going. "He'll go to any lengths to make you happy. He blows off dates and his friends just to have drinks with you when you're being moody. You pulled him out of bed in the middle of the night and dragged him out to the bar in his pyjamas to keep you company, and he did it. He puts up with you calling him girl names and pretending you hate him, even if it's not his favourite thing, because he knows that by degrading him so much that you're giving him special attention and that it means you care for him more than other people. He's been there for you with all the bad things. When you fight with Jordan, when I died, when Jen was sick before even being born. When those patients died he was the only one who managed to get through to you."

Ben was staring at me intensely, his arms folded in a way similar to my own. I could only focus on his arms because I couldn't make myself look him in the face at the moment. He had hit way too close to home. But wasn't that exactly what he was here for?

"Thanks."

"No problem," Ben answered and shrugged. Quite suddenly, all the seriousness had left his face and he was grinning that same ridiculously wide smile. It occurred to me, not for the first time in my life, that he looked like some sort of cartoon. "What else are dead best friends for than a good slap in the face, right?"

"You really think I can fix all this?" I asked.

Ben smiled wider. "Of course you can," he said. "After all, you're the one who's had all these ideas and advice to begin with. I'm just the figment of your imagination that you use to tell yourself the truth. So long as you stop talking for a second of your life and just listen to yourself for once, you'll be fine." He paused and added, "Provided you're capable of not talking for a full second, that is. I dunno, you like the sound of your own voice too much."

"At least I'm not so in love with my face I'm constantly taking pictures of myself," I returned. We broke down into laughter, exchanging insults for a few more minutes before we started running out of steam. We stared at each other, our faces inches apart, and our smiles slowly relaxed. We were leaning in toward each other and I saw Ben's lids fluttering, hiding his eyes beneath a fringe of lashes. Two inches more.

"Augh!" I growled in defeat, turning my head away. Beside me, I could hear Ben whooping in victory.

"Still the king of Gay Chicken!" Ben shouted, jumping down off the bed and raising his arms above his head in a little victory dance. "God, Perry, I'm not even real and you still can't do it." I just shook my head, fighting back the urge to smile. "I've missed you, buddy."

"I know, I've missed you too," I admitted, my smile faltering slightly.

"But you know, I'll always be right here," Ben said in an overly heartfelt voice, pointing to my forehead, "for whenever you get crazy enough to bring me out again." I chuckled appreciatively. "And you know, for when I'm not here…" He trailed off but his gaze slipped past my shoulder to fix on something else. I didn't have to look to understand what he was saying, and I gave a nod. "Glad to hear it. Now, how 'bout the BFFs see if we can catch at least the final highlights of tonight's game. It'd make my day if the Penguins are one step closer to the Stanley."

"Oh God, how were we ever friends?" I asked in disgust, shaking my head. I turned to look for the television remote on the side table and added, "And please do not say BFFs, that's a little girl thing. Acceptable from Newbie but worrisome from you and sickening to me." Finding the stupid remote, I swivelled back, expecting to see Ben laughing at the comment. He wasn't.

He was gone.

"Always gotta leave without saying good-bye, doncha?" I said aloud, just a bit disappointed. I knew he wasn't real but I had hoped to spend just a little more time pretending that he was. After a moment, I relocated myself to the hard plastic chair and once again set my crossed ankles on the corner of the bed. "Whaddya say, Rachel, wanna catch up on the hockey game?" I glanced at Newbie's unresponsive face and then pressed the power button, watching the screen blink into life. After a little channel jumping, I found ESPN and the highlights from today's game were playing. A glance at the scoreboard in the corner made me grimace.

_Red Wings: 3_

_Penguins: 5_

"Damn you, Ben." Still, I was smiling as I relaxed back and watched the replays of my team's gruesome defeat.


	19. His Morning After

_When unexpected things happen, we all tend to throw up this wall of shock to protect ourselves. This denial lets us accept the truth at a less jarring pace. It acts as a little buffer to block out the stuff that's painful to absorb until we are ready to let it in. It works really well for what it does, but it doesn't make that time when you have to fully accept the truth any less painful._

"Um – Dr Cox?"

The voice didn't startle me awake as much as the tentative hand that landed on my shoulder at the same time. I bolted upright and instantly regretted it. My head swam at the motion, creating a dull pounding in the centre of my forehead. Dazzlingly bright whiteness stung my eyes, intensifying the headache, and I pressed my eyes shut again. The cottony sensation in my mouth felt like it must muffle my groan but it didn't. Instead, the noise seemed to drive into my ear drums like a needle, along with the various beeps and hums coming from around me.

"Whoa, sorry, man, maybe I shouldna woke you, you just look like you could use a break."

"Gandhi, shhh," I commanded, pressing the heel of my hand to my forehead. For once, he listened to me. It was several long minutes later when I finally felt steady enough to look up again.

My eyes slowly adjusted to the blinding white, enough at least to recognise where I was. I had fallen asleep, my head propped on my crossed arms which had been resting on the edge of a hospital bed. The occupant was still unconscious and completely unaware of the dozen machines attached to his body. A television mounted in the corner was playing an early morning ESPN recap of the previous day's games. Gandhi was standing beside me, looking nervous.

"Dude, you look awful," he said.

"Thanks," I grunted out. I pulled a hand back through my hair, wincing as my fingers caught in my tangled curls, and then rubbed my face until I felt a little more awake.

"Here," Gandhi said, handing out a steaming Coffeebucks cup. I raised a questioning eyebrow but took it anyway. When I sipped at it, I couldn't stop my look of disgust.

"Dear god, what is this sludge?" I asked once I'd managed to swallow.

Gandhi chuckled. "Sugar-free latte," he answered. Despite the casual way he said it, I recognised the order and knew what it meant. As if he could read my thoughts, he simply said, "You looked like you could use it more."

"Thanks," I said again and took another swallow, grimacing at the taste but grateful for the caffeine I could already feel slipping into my systems.

"Any improvement?" he asked, his eyes slipping past me to the bed.

"Nope, same as last night," I replied, trying to keep the disappointment out of my voice. "You working?"

"Nah, just got off," Gandhi answered. "Was on-call last night. Why?"

"'Cause I'm putting you on babysitting duty," I announced, standing up. "I'm gonna go remedy my hangover, so you get to stay and keep an eye on Princess." With that I stalked past him and down to the lockers, sucking down the awful coffee on the way. Thankfully everyone was smart enough to leave me the hell alone.

Of course, when I got to the locker room and caught sight of myself in the mirrors, I realised another reason they may have been hurrying away. Gandhi was right; I looked awful. My face was red except for the sleep rings beneath my bloodshot eyes. My hair hung in limp, knotted curls. My tee-shirt was creased and the dress slacks were wrinkled beyond recognition. Red and grey stubble had sprouted along my jaw overnight. Overall, I looked like the drunk hobos that sometimes hung out in the ER waiting room on cold nights.

Stripping down, I stepped into the showers and let the hot water roll over my body. Added to the caffeine, I finally started to feel coherent again. Not to mention I was definitely smelling better. I must have spilt last night because I smelled vaguely of stale alcohol. I got a pair of scrub pants from the machines and pulled my cotton shirt back on, examining myself in the mirror again. Much better.

Paranoid that my car would be towed, I walked briskly back to the bar, wincing against the burning sunlight that was doing nothing for my headache. Thankfully my Porsche was still sitting in the car park, which was near empty this time of day, and I drove her back to the hospital. After reclaiming my sacred parking spot, I made my way to Coffeebucks and growled my way to the front of the line, without much trouble since I'm sure I still looked a bit like a madman, and ordered two large coffees. Cups of God's gift to doctors in hand, I returned to Newbie's room. I'd been gone for over an hour. _S_ _omething had to have changed by now,_ I thought without much real hope. When I got there, Gandhi had filled my chair and I stopped in the doorway to listen as he talked to his inanimate best friend.

"And dude, I hope you come to soon or, swear to God, Elliot's gonna explode. You should have heard her when Carla called her last night. She did that thing where her voice gets so high-pitched you can't really hear it but you feel it. My ears were bleeding and I wasn't even  _on_  the phone. I guess she called in sick today. Carla's over with her now."

"Oh good," I said, finally stepping into the room. I didn't want to hear more about Newbie's grief-stricken gal pals and their fears that their fabulous leader had been dethroned for good. "You stayed like a good boy." Gandhi just turned to look at me. "Here," I grunted, thrusting one of the coffee cups at him. He eyed it suspiciously and I gave a wry laugh. "It's not poisoned, Gandhi, it's to replace the one you gave me."

At this, his expression relaxed and he accepted it. "Sugar-free?" he asked, sniffing it.

"You think I want your wife going crazy Latina on my ass for messing with your precious blood sugar level?" I retorted sarcastically and he laughed into his coffee. "No thanks, I deal with enough crazy women already, between Jordan and Suzy here, no need for more."

"Thanks," Gandhi said gratefully, although whether it was gratitude at the coffee or for not pissing off his wildly temperamental wife I wasn't sure. I felt his eyes on my back as I left the room again but I ignored it as I walked to the nurses' station and stole one of the rolling office chairs. The scalpel jockey was, for some odd reason that I probably didn't want to know, grinning as I pushed the pilfered chair into the room and around to the opposite side of the bed. We said nothing to each other as I situated myself, propping my feet on the metal rail that edged the bed and angling where I could watch the life-support machines.

"So," I said, drawing out the word while I tried to think of something to say. "Carla tell you?"

"No, the Todd," Gandhi admitted with a grimace. I understood the pain; that idiot was not the best at breaking bad news. I had always pitied the families of people he killed on the table. "I was supposed to go up and see JD after I got done with Trowell's heart valve replacement, but I was on-call and kept getting sent off to do other stuff. About midnight I got up there and his room was empty. Todd was walking by and told me what happened. He'd been part of the surgery."

"I don't remember you coming in last night," I said.

"I didn't," Gandhi said and shifted uncomfortably. "I came by but you were already here and you looked pretty, uh, preoccupied."

I worked hard to keep my expression impassive while I sipped at my coffee. A lot of the details of the previous night were hazy but the fact that I had been holding a conversation with a person that only I could see was crystal clear. And the realisation that I had forgotten to close the blinds only just came to me. God, I hope he assumed I was talking to myself or, at worst, to Newbie. "You shoulda come in anyway," I said and shrugged. "Cami here is your girlfriend after all."

Gandhi rolled his eyes. "Girl jokes still?"

"Always," I insisted and turned my attention fully to my coffee, which was now only luke-warm. We sat in an easy quiet, punctuated by beeping and whirring machinery and the natural hum of the hospital beyond the door, long enough for me to finish my glorious cup of energy.

Gandhi watched the cup sail across the room and into the garbage bin in the corner, giving a small nod to acknowledge my great shot. Can't let him forget I'm still better than him at basketball, even if I am playing nice for now. He looked thoughtful and chewed at his lower lip for a second. "So, that idiot intern - ?"

"Was treated for a broken nose after being fired," I answered the unfinished question with just a hint of pride coming out. To my surprise, Gandhi smiled at this.

"Good," he said and then tossed his own coffee cup to join my own in the bin, rebounding it off the wall. "'Though Carla'll probably have something to say 'bout that when she gets in."

"I figured," I said without much concern. "It was worth it."

"He's just lucky I wasn't there," Gandhi chipped in and crossed his arms on his chest, pulling up the one side of his upper lip like he always did when trying to look tough. I fought the urge to inform him that it made him look like he needed to sneeze.

"Yeah, you'd have avenged your fallen lover, I get it," I said, rolling my eyes. However, this triggered a realisation. Lover. I needed to let Kim know about this. And at the thought of calling her, I remembered someone else I had yet to call. "Hey, Gumball, you don't happen to have Dan's number, do ya?"

"Dan?" Gandhi repeated, looking confused.

"Yes, Dan," I said in exasperation. "Daniel Dorian; tall, goofy-looking, pretty stupid. Snow White here's brother. Ringing any bells in that shiny dome of yours?"

"I know who you're talking about," Gandhi snapped. "I was just wondering why."

"Well, I dunno, maybe I got in touch with my sensitive side and thought I'd invite him out for tea so I could apologise for being such a bully to him, and then we could bond over a day of shoe shopping and mani-pedis," I said with as much sarcasm as I could possibly muster. Counter-productive, but I was too tired to deal with his attitude right now. Gandhi just waited for me to finish and get to my real point. "Or maybe it's 'cause I thought he might need to know that his baby sister here is in the hospital in a coma."

"You haven't told him?" Gandhi asked in disbelief.

"I don't have a number, genius," I answered with a one-shouldered shrug. "That's why I'm asking. Jane here only listed you as his emergency contact so I didn't worry. The right person was informed. Course, then we were sure he'd get better, but now – " I trailed off for a moment and saw the hidden fear on Gandhi's face emerge in my pause. "Now I just think he should know. In case."

Gandhi's face was all grim lines as he nodded. "I don't have it but I'll call Carla. She can swing by JD's apartment on her way here later and see if she can find it."

After he made his phone call, we sank back into silence. Unlike the first time, though, this one was tense with the foreboding thought I'd brought up. There was no denying that the 'what if' factor was a lot higher this time. A whole swarm of questions and facts were filling my head but one more so than all the others: What if he didn't recover this time?

All of the dark possibilities that had occurred to me the night before seemed so much sharper and more menacing now. Last night's shock, which had acted as a sort of foggy barrier that softened the truth, was gone. I was now being forced to stand face-to-face with the odds that were telling me that it was very likely Newbie wasn't going to come out of this one. That I might have said my last words to him. Heard his whiny voice for the last time. Brushed aside his final pleas for my affection. That I might never again be able to walk around these halls with him tailing me, begging me to go to lunch with him or let him come over and watch a hockey game he'd never understand, or just wanting my approval. Just wanting me to affirm what he already knew, that he was a good doctor and I was proud of him and what he'd become.

A few minutes of brooding on this finally got the best of me. Standing up so quickly that my chair rolled back against the wall and rebounded enough to hit the backs of my knees again, I wordlessly left the room.


	20. His Relunctant Peek Inside

_Serious things always seem to force us to do a lot of introspection, which is not something I enjoy doing, for the record. It seems like whenever we are faced with a life-altering possibility, we instantly have to dive inward and do a whole heap of that soul-searching answer-seeking. This also generally leads to a few things that we have to deal with that we didn't think were true. Those little things we've denied to ourselves, but when we turn inward we find that contradicting evidence, and it always results in the same inner battle of wits as both sides of your consciousness duke it out to see what you're going to continue believing; your outward denial and misconceptions, or the inner reality._

After my hour long break of watching a college football game, because my favourite soap seemed to be filled with an excess of comas and deaths today, I spent the rest of the day keeping myself busy.

I dug up the post-it note with Kim Briggs' phone number and called her, letting her know what happened. Then I divided my time between paperwork and patients, stealing them off residents and interns to give myself something to do. Later, when Carla showed up, I called Dan at the number she had found taped to Newbie's fridge. His answering machine informed me that he was at a realtor's conference for the week so I left a message telling him everything, and then gave him my number for when he got back. Then I threw myself back into my work.

"Knock knock." I looked up as my office door swung open and Jordan came in, carrying Jennifer. Jack pushed past her and jumped on me.

"Pewwy!" he yelled, squeezing me and then settling himself into my lap.

"Hey there, Jacky," I said, ruffling his hair. "What are you guys doing here?"

"The kids wanted to come by and see you," Jordan said and perched herself on the corner of my desk. "Why aren't you in with DJ?"

"I have work to do," I said evasively. "I don't have the time, or the want, to sit around all day and babysit Allison."

"Oh please," Jordan said in exasperation, rolling her eyes. "We both know it's where you want to be. You can't tell me that you don't care that your puppy's in a coma."

"Puppy?" Jack asked, suddenly very interested.

"Not a real puppy, honey," Jordan explained and Jack immediately went back to playing with my stethoscope.

"I honestly don't want to be in there," I insisted.

"You know, you're doing the same thing that little girl's dad did." Jordan's tone was off-hand but it still caught my full focus. I instantly regretted ranting about the Marks' to her after work that one day. I should've known the she-witch would find a way to use it against me. "Staying away because it's too hard on you. But you know, I bet that now his kid's gone, he's really wishing he could have been there for her. How are you gonna feel if DJ goes and you weren't there?"

"It's not the same, Jordan!" I said firmly. Jordan was completely unabashed, although she narrowed her eyes dangerously as Jack looked alarmed at my outburst. Feeling guilty, I lowered my voice. "He's not my son."

"Not in blood," Jordan said calmly. "But does that really matter? You loved Jack before you knew he was yours, blood didn't matter then. But DJ sees you as his dad and we all know that you love the attention and the pride of making him into a semi-decent doctor, and that's what should really matter." She paused to let this sink in. "The rest of us get it, Perry, so get out of your own way and quit being such an ass."

"Sush an ass," Jack echoed with a grin.

"Good boy, Jack," Jordan said. Then she turned back to me. "Don't worry, you'll have some time to think about it so long as DJ doesn't snuff it soon. I know you're not gonna want to leave here until he wakes up because of your 'Ben-complex,'" she said, making air-quotes with one hand, "so the kids and I are going up to my mom's for the week. Spend some time with Grandma, huh Jack?"

Jack looked up at me with fear in his eyes. Yep, that's my boy. "Jordan, you don't have to do that," I said resignedly. "I'll come home."

"Then you'll come home to an empty house," Jordan said simply. "We're already packed, we just stopped by so the kids could say bye."

"Jordan – "

"Perry, quit fighting me, you know you'll lose." Jordan stood up and I mirrored her, standing Jack on the desk. "I'll call you when we get there."

Knowing I'd lost, I took Jennifer and kissed her forehead. She laughed and her hand closed around my curls, tugging. Jordan was grinning as she pried the hand away, returning Jen to her hip.

"Okay, Jack," I said, and he looked up at me curiously. "Be good and cause lots of trouble at Grandma's house. And be careful to never look her in the eye or she'll turn into a monster and eat your soul." Jack's eyes went wide and, behind me, I heard Jordan make a noise somewhere between annoyance and amusement. "You remember that, okay?"

"Okay, daddy," Jack agreed with a solemn nod. Or as solemn as a four-year-old gets.

"Good kid," I said, smiling. "Now gimme a kiss." Jack eagerly obliged, squashing my nose in the process, and I swung him down to the floor. Once I was standing again, Jordan caught my chin in her free hand and kissed me forcefully.  _Wow, don't let her see how weak in the knees you get when she does that._ As if she didn't already know.

"Now go, Per," she said when we broke apart. "It's where you need to be." Then with one last kiss on the cheek, she took Jack's hand and they left.

I sat back down at my desk. I still refused to believe what Jordan had been saying. JD was not my son, nor would I ever consider him so. Still, something in what she'd said, though, comparing me to Lily's father, made me uneasy. How could I be like that moron? I mean, I wasn't, really, because I didn't have a child dying of an incurable disease. I had an annoying colleague-slash-shadow in a coma that we weren't sure he could come out of. So why did I feel so guilty?

_You know why._

Damn, conscience is back again. Still, I figured that it wouldn't hurt to check in and see if there had been any changes. I was his doctor after all. I hauled myself up and went down to the room. Carla gave me a knowing smile when she saw me pass but her eyes were sad. I kept going without a word and stopped in the doorway.

The only change was that the chair by the bed was empty. I guessed Gandhi had gone to get some sleep before his next shift. Newbie looked exactly the same as before; skin pale, eyes shut, mouth limp around the breathing tube. Unmoving and unaware of his delicate situation.

See, there was another way I wasn't like Mr Marks. Lily had been fully conscious, fully aware of the fact that her father was ignoring her. Newbie wasn't. He was in a coma, he wouldn't know if I wasn't here. My being with him didn't make the slightest bit of difference to his condition or affect him in any way really. If he died, I wouldn't feel any worse for not being here watching him sleep. It didn't make a difference either way, did it?

But what if coma patients really can hear you? The thought came to me again, just like it had the night of Newbie's accident. What if he could hear me? What if he knew who was sitting with him? He could die without ever hearing me and then he would die feeling abandoned. Could I deal with that? Of course I could, I didn't believe coma patients really do hear the people around them. They're practically brain dead, for God's sake. At the same time, I still feel that guilt thing in my chest.

I don't know how long I was standing there arguing with myself before I was aware of someone coming up behind me. She didn't seem to notice me until she was already inside the room. "Oh, Dr Cox, hi."

"Dr Briggs."

"Nothing still?" Kim asked, her voice devoid of hope as she shifted Sam on her hip. I shook my head. Kim crossed to the bed and her free hand tentatively closed around one of Newbie's, rubbing the back of his wrist with her thumb. After a minute. her fingers moved up his arm, never fully breaking contact, and she placed her palm against his bleached cheek.

"I thought he was getting better," she said quietly.

"He was," I said, feeling that familiar swell of anger in my chest. Finally, an emotion I understood. Quell the guilt with anger; my typical standby.

Kim frowned, tracing her thumb along Newbie's cheekbone. "So his chances…"

"Are pretty low, yeah," I finished for her. "Twenty-five percent at best would be my guess, with a high probability of permanent damage if he does come out of it." Kim's lips trembled. Sam had turned to stare at the prone figure and he squealed in recognition, extending his hands toward his dad. This was apparently the breaking point for Kim. Before I even realised she'd moved, she was out the door and Sam was in my arms. I heard her choked sob as she jogged into the bathroom down the hall.

More than just a little confused by the sudden turn of events, I sat down in the rolling chair I'd left in there earlier, settling Sam on my lap awkwardly. The little boy wriggled and kept reaching out for the bed, whining, so I pushed the chair closer and helped him to stand up on my knees. Sam leant forward against my grip and grabbed one of Newbie's fingers in his little fist. When Newbie didn't react, Sam looked back at me. His wide, blue eyes were full of questions and it hit me just then how much they looked like his father's.

"Don't worry, kid," I said gently. "Your dad's gonna come outta this." I wondered briefly if kids were as good at detecting lies as animals were. I shook it off, trying to convince myself that I wasn't lying. "He won't leave us behind. _You_. He won't leave you behind." Sam was tugging at Newbie's fingers and he whimpered again. When he turned to me again, his lower lip was pushed out in a familiar pout. Once again, the similarity astounded me.

The chin quiver was a tell-tale sign and a second later, the cry split the stiff air of the room. Paternal instinct kicked in and in an instant I had pulled Sam against my chest, wrapping my arms around him and rubbing small circles against his back. I felt the short arms secure themselves around my neck, fingers gripping at the back of my tee-shirt, and the crying was muffled as Sam buried his face in my collarbone. Falling back into the routine of my own children, I stood up and began pacing a short line between the bed and the door, my steps taking on a bouncing, rocking gait.

"Easy there, Newbie Jr," I murmured. "It's gonna be okay. I promise you, kiddo, it's gonna be okay." About round seventeen on my make-shift track, I heard the volume of the sobs dropping distinctly into sniffles. Four more trips and the sniffles became shuddery breaths, and then six more loops changed the shudders to steady, deep breaths. Convinced that Sam was asleep, I returned to the chair and sat down, occasionally making a whispered shushing noise if the boy shifted against my neck.

As if the pain in my chest wasn't bad enough, now I had this little offspring of Newbie sleeping in my arms, his head pressing the coolness of tear-dampened fabric against my collarbone. Damned Newbie. I almost wished that coma patients could hear the people around them just so he could hear the misery he was putting his little boy through by being in a coma. Maybe that would make him come back.

That look of heartbreak on Sammy's face was haunting my mind. That look of the little boy who had no idea why his energetic, doting, loving father was just laying there sleeping and ignoring the son that he usually would never let go of if he didn't have to. It was honestly scary to see that much terror and hurt on a one-year-old's face. But what was even more frightening, not to mention confusing, was that as I had stared at that face it wasn't Sammy who I was really seeing. I had imagined a different doe-eyed, pouty-lipped person. And, alarmingly, that had shaken me to my core.

Why? Well, I supposed it was feasible that seeing that much fear on any person's face was shocking. But why Newbie? Why did all of this have to give people like Carla and Jordan and Ben all the more evidence against me? Because it couldn't be true. I didn't care about Trisha  _that_  much. I'll admit that I cared, I think it was definitely too late to bother trying to deny that. So I cared, a little. What can I say? After eight years, the girl had grown on me a bit. But not that much. Not the way he wanted me to see him. He was an employee that I respected because honestly, the kid wasn't that bad a doctor. He was a colleague who I generally trusted not to mess up everything he touched. He might be a –  _shuddering at thinking this word_  – friend. But he was most definitely  _nawt_  my protégé. And even more so, he was  _nawt_  my son.

But who was I kidding? Okay, so maybe the protégé thing has just the slightest bit of truth in it. I just really don't like using that word. Maybe I'll have to find a different word for Newbie to use when he comes out of this and I'll let him get away with that. Something like… apprentice? Ugh, no that makes me think of Donald Trump. But I'll come up with something.

None of that changes the fact that Newbie is not my son. He might have whittled away at me to get the colleague thing, and then the friend, and even the not-protégé thing, but this one he wasn't going to win. As much as he might want me to be his father figure, I refuse. It's not happening. He's a big girl, he doesn't need to have his daddy around to take care of him. I'll be his boss and his teacher and even, occasionally, something like a friend, but I'm not going to be his father.

A flash of blonde made me look up and I saw Kim coming back into the room. Her eyes were red, but she seemed to have stopped crying. "I'm–" I cut her off with a shush and pointed at Sam. She nodded and lowered her voice. "I'm sorry about that," she whispered, crossing to stand in front of me, wrapping her arms around herself. "I just – this is a bit too much to take in." I just nodded, not knowing what more to say. Comforting people is re- _heely_  not my forte. "Thanks for watching Sam," she added. "I can – I can take him back now if you like."

I stood up carefully, wincing as my back and knees groaned in protest. Dear God, when did I suddenly get so old that a night sleeping in a chair took this much out of me? Being careful not to jostle Sam too much, I unwrapped his arms from around my neck and handed him off to Kim. She adjusted him against her chest and in an instant, his sleepy grumbles had faded back into normal breathing. "You gonna be okay?" I asked quietly.

Kim took a deep breath and cast a glance at JD. "I don't know," she said sincerely. "For now, I think so. But if he – I don't know." She sighed heavily, her breath hitching just slightly. "Just – let me know if anything changes?"

I nodded in reply, stuffing my hands down into my pockets awkwardly. Kim hesitated for a moment longer, then thanked me and left. I had only just gotten to settle into my chair when another weepy-eyed blonde appeared, hovering in the doorway and clamping what looked like a fistful of tissues in one hand.  _Oh no._

"Hi, Dr Cox," Barbie choked out.  _If you have any mercy, lemme just keel over now._

"Barboo," I responded, crossing my arms and making myself comfortable. Maybe if I made it apparent that I wasn't moving, she would leave. I needed to keep thinking and this had seemed like a nice, quiet place to do it.

Apparently no such luck, as Barbie sat down in the other chair, scooting it closer to the bed with a screech that made my hangover headache resurface, and taking a hold of JD's hand in the one that wasn't clutching the Kleenexes. She kept glancing up at me, mouth open like she was going to say something, but I effectively silenced her with a glare every time and she would return to surveying Newbie. Okay, so maybe this wasn't going to be so bad.

After fifteen minutes of the quiet repetition, Barbie seemed to have gotten sick of the silence. But instead of talking to me, she leant closer to the mattress and began with, "Oh God, JD, this isn't fair." I thought about telling her to shut it but decided against it. I could tune her out if I had to; I'd been doing it for years. At least she wasn't talking that loud. Grunting, I leant back in my chair and closed my eyes, escaping into the darkness and solace of my mind. After seeing that I wasn't about to murder her, Blondie started talking again in a low voice.

"I can't believe this has happened to you," she was saying in her thick voice that betrayed the fact that she was trying not to cry more. "I thought you were getting better. Things just – they aren't working out for you. The accident and the amnesia, and then your friend Lily dies, and then this. God, why JD? I don't get it. You don't deserve it."

Well, that much was for sure. I mean, the kid was annoying as all hell but there were certainly people far more deserving of this much pain and misery. Like Republicans. Or Michael Moore. Or, perhaps most of all, Hugh Jackman. But not Newbie.

Barbie stopped with the pity party after this and launched into a more casual conversation as if she was just venting about a normal day to her friend after work. She told little jokes that seemed to amuse her but that I didn't understand, nor did I want to. She rambled endlessly about some weird guy she had run into at the grocery store who reminded her of some random person from her past, who had been part of one of her weird little sexual daydreams.  _Sweet Jesus, she's a whole keg of crazy._  And the entire time she talked, she ignored me and let me pretend to be sleeping.

About midnight, Jordan called me to let me know that she had made it to her mother's lair and that, because of me, every time Mrs Sullivan looked at Jack he would scream and cover his face, running out of the room. Jordan had feigned ignorance as to why this was happening, and Jack wouldn't stay in the room long enough to explain, all of which had left the older woman completely baffled and disturbed. I felt a certain sort of smug satisfaction from the knowledge that even though the restraining order kept me away, I could torment the old hag vicariously through my son. Even though she tried to hide it, I could tell Jordan thought it was funny and her parting insult as she went to hang up lacked the bite she usually forced. She even managed to say an almost nice, if reluctant-sounding, goodnight before abruptly ending the call so I couldn't reply.

I returned to my previous attempt at sleeping while Barbie continued on with her monologue, although it was admittedly very difficult to sleep with that thing screeching, no matter how quietly she was trying for. Shutting my eyes, I relaxed back into the chair and retreated back into that safe place in my head where I could think. I had only been there for about five minutes when I found out that my thoughts were not going to lead me anywhere I had the desire to go, so I finally settled for pretending to sleep and half-listening to the mumbo that Barbie continued to run off about until she finally got too tired and trooped off to go home with a bleary, "Night, Dr Cox."

With her gone, I finally straightened up in my chair again. It was over; the first twenty-four hours. When a patient went into a coma, their greatest chance of recovery was in the first twenty-four. Their chances declined exponentially with every day after that. I would never - I repeat ne- _hever -_  admit this aloud even on pain of being forced to kiss Hugh Jackman, but as I stared at that pale, calm face that seemed even more bleached by the fluorescent lighting, I was scared shitless. From this point on, the medical faith went out the window. From now on, we'd be living off a hope and a prayer and, if things went wrong, a whole lot of scotch.

 


	21. His Last Ditch

_Sometimes when we're fighting a losing battle, we have to throw out all the stops and give it everything we've got. And almost always, every one of those is a failure. But when you start losing hope, there's always that one last thing you've got to try before surrendering completely. That last ditch attempt. If it works, you can bolster your morale, pull back and win. And if it fails, then you've just got to go ahead and bow out gracefully before you get steamrollered._

The next four days passed in almost the same way that that night had. I spent most of the next ninety-six hours sitting in that same chair in Newbie's room, leaving only for coffee, bathroom breaks, and the occasional catnap in the on-call room during the day. When I went down to my car after the first day, resigned to having to go home for fresh clothes and a shave, I found a duffel bag in the passenger seat of my Porsche, filled with several sets of clothes. Smiling, knowing it had to be Jordan's doing, I grabbed a clean outfit and returned to the hospital. I really hadn't wanted to leave the grounds anyway. Not out of paranoia, just – _convenience_. I took showers in the locker room, shaved with a razor I nicked out of the supply closet, and collected my lunches from the cafeteria to eat up in the ICU, usually with the company of at least one of Newbie's gal pals. The rest of the time I spent working on paperwork I brought in with me or pretending to sleep while the mod squad sat and talked to JD.

And although we were all trying to hide it from each other, with each minute that passed without the slightest change, we were all losing hope. I could see it on all their faces when they came in, and while they tried to talk in natural tones to the prone figure, and when they exchanged looks as one person left to be replaced by the next.

By the fifth morning, marking exactly one month since his accident, the hope was practically gone. The visits started becoming shorter and their talking was forced. After her morning visit, Barbie left crying and wasn't seen for the rest of the day. Gandhi marched out stiffly with a horribly vacant expression on his face. Carla only stood by the bed the entire time, stroking Newbie's head gently and staring at him with a sad smile. After five minutes of that, she had simply walked away with a single tear on her cheek. Admittedly, seeing that tear had struck me harder than anything else I had seen or heard over the last few days. That tear wasn't typical girlish sadness; that was the single tear of heartbreak. That was the tear of Carla giving up hope.

And if Carla Espinoza was giving up, then how could the rest of us hold out any longer?

"Damn it, Newbie," I swore aloud, throwing myself out of the chair in frustration. It was well past eleven o'clock now and the ICU was nearly silent in the late hour. Although everyone else had gone home for the night, I was retaining my all-night vigil at his bedside. Just in case. "You can't do this!" Growling, I pulled my hands through my hair and laced them together behind my head. All of the stressful emotions, which had doubled in the last week, were brimming inside me. I paced an anxious circle in the room, trying to calm myself.

"Damn it, Newbie," I said again. "Why do you have to make this so difficult?" The words were escaping me before I even registered that I was thinking them. "Everything was all fine and normal, and then you had to come in that morning all in a tissy, and now–" My words trailed off into a growl but as I set eyes on that pale figure I felt the anger rush out of me, replaced by a different emotion entirely.

Sighing, I closed the door and twisted the blinds shut. If I was going to crack and give this a shot, I didn't want people being able to watch. I didn't honestly want to do it at all but I knew I had to, if only for the sake of what little sanity I still had.

With another loud sigh, I sank back into my chair. "Damn it, Newbie," I said again, this time without much conviction. "You always gotta make things complicated, doncha?" A short laugh slipped, unbidden, from my mouth. "Everything was normal before this. It was all habits and routine. I was used to that and I knew what was going on and generally what to expect. I liked that. I liked the sense of control that gives. As doctors we don't have a lot of control around here, at least not near as much as we like to think. So things being normal was nice."

I leant back, rubbing my hands over my face. "Then this mess with you starts and all that goes straight out the window," I said with another small chuckle. "I mean, c'mon Natalie, couldn't you just leave well enough alone? I was happy with the way things were. They made sense. Now... God, now everything is just so damn confusing. I don't understand what is happening anymore, with you and with me and all this mess between us especially."

I fell silent for a moment, trying to get my head cleared because I was having a hard time thinking straight. All of this frustration and thinking that had been building inside me for the last month was reaching its boiling point and now it was all filling my head so fast I couldn't make sense of it. Which is probably why I felt crazy enough to be reduced to ranting to Newbie's unconscious body like he was my shrink. Hmm, maybe that was my problem, I hadn't been to either of my shrinks for a while…

"You know, I guess I shouldn't be surprised it's you that I'm talking to, should I?" I asked aloud to the quiet room, with a hollow laugh. "It's always you, isn't it? The one who's there to listen to me when it's all too much. I don't get it, I don't know why. I have plenty of other people I can talk to; that I  _do_  talk to when things are bothering me. My shrinks, Jordan, Carla, in instances of extreme insanity it's Ben. But every time I get to the breaking point, it's always you, kid. I guess it's like Dr Gross said: I gotta keep you around because, for god knows what reason, you are the only person that can get through to me.

"Like that time with the transplant patients. I don't know what was going on in my head then, I still can't figure it all out honestly. When I realised everyone was coming to see me, I couldn't have cared less really. I didn't want the company but I was too numb to be bothered with telling 'em to get out. But, and trust me I am  _so_  not proud to admit this, every time that door opened I kept hoping it was you who was coming. I don't know why because I really didn't want to face you after all that. And then when Carla told me you weren't coming, God, Newbie, I was disappointed. Because even with all that, I could only think that I had ruined whatever ass-backwards friendship we had and that you never wanted to see me again. Not that I blame you one minute for that, really."

I was no longer aware at all of what I was saying or where I was going with it. I was just talking, letting everything come out of me without bothering to throw up the filters I normally kept between my brain and mouth. That insane urge to just keep talking had possessed me and I was too fried to care anymore. I just let it all come out, my brain taking the monologue wherever it pleased.

"You know, I have never been more relieved or more terrified than that moment you showed up at the door. I was relieved because it meant you had finally gotten over your anger enough to be able to face me but at the same time, I was so scared of what you were going to say. I was afraid you'd judge me and tell me how disappointed you were in me. And in a way, you did tell me something like that. But ya know, Lola, in some sick, twisted way, hearing that you were proud of me and that, despite that all, you still wanted to be like me, well damn that was the thing that all of a sudden made it seem okay. I don't know why but it was the only thing that really helped. Cleared my head. All of a sudden everything seemed to have fixed itself and when you poured yourself that scotch, well, I answered before even remembering that I'd been a self-proclaimed mime until then. You don't know – or who knows, maybe you do know – just how much sway you got over me.

"Lemme tell ya, when I went home that day after the patients died, when I was drunk at work, I have honestly never been more ashamed of myself in my life. 'Cause it was you who had to see me like that. 'Cause even though everything else was fuzzy, I remember clearer than anything else that look of disappointment on your face. That – Jack's the only other person in the world who could make me feel as bad with that look. And Jen, I imagine, when she gets old enough to give me those sorta looks.

"Dear Lord, here I am comparing you to my kids, just like everyone else. You're not my kid, Newbie. I know that. Hell, you know that. Everyone keeps pushing that idea on me but it just doesn't work. I know you want me to be like your dad, but I'm not. I'll admit to being your teacher but not your dad. I'm not taking on that sort of responsibility. Besides, that'd make me a grandpa already and I'm not taking that hurdle yet. I'm just barely getting over the dad one, I'm not jumpin' myself up another generation." I gave another laugh, less empty than before. "Imagine the field day Jordaroo would have with the old man jokes on that one." I laughed again and rubbed a tired hand over my face.

"She, uh, she sends her best by the way," I added, awkwardly. I couldn't quite fathom what the point of sending your best anything to a coma patient was, unless it was your best consciousness to wake them up. "She's taken the kids up to her mom's lurk-hole for the week. Poor things. I'm glad I can't be dragged up there anymore, the woman honestly makes Jor look like an angel. Thank God for that whole restraining order thing. The woman was overreacting really, all I did was start a  _little_  fire in the kitchen. Course, I was extremely drunk and accidentally lit the Christmas turkey on fire, and then when she came in screaming she scared me so bad I threw the bottle of scotch I was drinking at her. It didn't much hit her, bounced off her leg, but it doused her damn little hairball of a dog, a Pomeranian I think is what she called it, and the stupid thing ran at me and wound up catching itself on fire instead." I lapsed into laughter, remembering that fateful Christmas. "God, that was a fun day," I remarked wistfully.

"That's a good lesson for ya, kid, don't get one of those yappy little moron dogs. Thing's got more fur than brains. Hell, it's got more just about anything than brains. When you finally decide to get a dog that's still among the living, get yourself something big and smart. Like a labradoodle." I gave a quiet snort of laughter at the comment, remembering having called him that very same thing a time or two. Not that he knew it was actually sorta a compliment. I'd had a labradoodle as a kid, best damn dog I ever had before my old man ran it off. "Ya know, when that kid of yours gets bigger, he's gonna beg you for a dog. One that actually barks and poops and plays and, well, _breathes_. Jacky's starting in on that stage now, just started asking for a puppy back around the end of summer. But I guess you still have a while off with your kid, he's still a little one.

"He really is your kid, isn't he? Well, I mean, I know he's  _yours_ , I just meant I can really see it. Looks just like you, although thankfully he inherited a chin from his mom 'cause the Lord sure didn't bless you with one. I hope he doesn't get your obsession with hair. You really are a girl, ya know. But he's – I think he's gonna turn out alright, really. He'll probably wind up crazy, and gay if you're his male role model, but still, he'll be alright. You're a good dad, ya know." I cleared my throat, the thickness making me suddenly aware of the fact I'd been talking for about an hour now. Jesus, I hadn't talked this much since the last time I was at the shrink's. Actually, I didn't think I'd ever talked for this long even there since I spent half the time listening to the so-called 'doctors' ridiculous mumbo-jumbo.  _Focus, Per, back on subject here._ "I can see it when you've got him around. I was worried with you being such a man-child but you do good with him. And you mustn'ta scarred him too badly yet if the other night is anything to judge by. Although you mighta just scarred him by ignoring him 'cause of your little coma thing."

The image of that little boy's look of terror flashed in my mind and I shook my head to get rid of it. "He's real scared you aren't gonna come back, ya know. I think everyone is," I said slowly. Here we are, getting into the deeper stuff.  _This is for you, Lily._  "Especially your gal pals, of course, but really there are lots of people worried about it. When I went down to Coffeebucks yesterday Bobbo was asking 'bout you and Carla said he actually stopped by for a second. Didn't expect that; thought he didn't have a heart enough to care. And of course, your interns are all kinds of confused and crazy still. Pawned them off on the other attendings because I just really don't want to deal with 'em. Oh, and Jumpsuit has been lurking in this hall a lot more than usual. I see him coming down and peeking in sometimes. Course I keep an eye on him 'cause I'm wondering if he's thinking about chuckin' you out the window. Or sneaking you off to stuff you and add you to his squirrel army." I couldn't repress a shudder at this. "Guy's a crazy bastard. Sorta makes me miss Hooch."

Another heavy sigh, propping my elbows on my knees. "It is pretty different not having you 'round," I admitted. "This whole last month has been strange. I mean, I was just getting used to my new job and not having to deal with you tailing me all day, but at least then you were still popping into the office every few minutes or attacking me in the halls with your daily lunch invites or whatever it is you feel like asking me to join you in for the day. Of course, you were still in the building and I still had to deal with you a lot, being your doctor and all, but that was different. I'm not gonna lie, after all these years of you practically stalking me, having you forget me was kinda weird. Okay, re _-heally_  weird. It feels like you've been gone for this last month even though you've been here the whole time. And it – I – ugh."

I stood up, the building rush of thoughts and emotions driving me to my feet. I couldn't hold still anymore, needed to be moving. Tangling my fingers in my hair, which I was sure probably looked a real mess by now with all the times I'd pulled at it today, I resumed pacing in that same circle from before. "All this time, all these years, I've been able to pretend that I didn't give a rat's ass what was going on with you. No, not pretend, I really didn't care. I don't give a shit. And then you come in with your big boy panties all in a twist. Well, God, Newbie that just had to go and mess everything up. You were being a sissy and had to go and avoid me all damn day and try to cut into that guy's chest without getting any sleep and then get all pissed off when I had to step in and save that guy's life. And then you storm off and almost fall off the roof and – damn it, kid, then you had to go and show me just how much you've become like me.

"I wasn't lying, all that time ago, when I said that I barely want to be me. Sure, my life's gotten just a little bit better since then. I've got my kid's, I finally got promoted, Jordan is slightly more tolerable nowadays. Or at least I only want to kill her every  _other_  day instead of every day now. But still, my life is nothing to aspire to. Kid, you've got a pretty good thing going for yourself. You're a good guy and you're a great doctor. You've got your kid, and you've got good friends, and you've got that thing with Barbie, whenever you both pull your heads out your asses enough to figure that out. You – you're better than me, kid, in a lot of ways. I mean, I'm obviously the stronger and more masculine one, generally smarter, and infinitely more attractive." I let out a small chuckle and realised that, without noticing, I had at some point crossed the room and sat back down. "But you, Newbie, you're almost as good a doctor as me and you've definitely got better bedside manner. I don't have the patience to deal with those moronic dipshits quite as well as you. And you're not the biggest idiot in this place. In fact, you've turned out pretty decent and I'm – I'm proud of you."

 _See, Per, that wasn't so hard._ I grimaced at the mockery in my conscience's voice. There are certainly times when I hate the fact that I'm an ass through and through. It means I'm even an ass to myself. "I know I'm awful at showing it, but you've always been really good about being there for me. I suppose maybe Ben's right, you have become something like a friend to me. And I know now he's up there in heaven rolling on his ass laughing at me for admitting this. And if you could hear me you'd be having a heart attack, so it's probably a good thing you're in a coma 'cause I don't think your little girly heart can take the strain. But you – you're a good friend, Newbie, and I can see why you've got as many friends as you do. And I'll probably never say this again but thanks for everything."

I let out a deep breath, rubbing my hands against my face roughly. Damn this being honest and forthright thing is exhausting. Or maybe it's just a week's worth of sleeping in chairs and on-call rooms finally catching up with me. "You know why I've been against that whole mentor/protégé thing you've got going through your head?" Now I'm asking questions of an unconscious guy. Really need sleep. "It's because of Pete. You remember him, I'd reckon, you seem to do a good job of remembering anything you find out about my life. I taught him everything, trusted him completely, even called him my protégé to colleagues. He was my best friend besides Ben, told him everything, let him into every aspect of my life really. I let him get close and I grew really attached to him, almost dependant in a way. And then when he and Jordan – Newbie, there's no betrayal like being betrayed by the two people you care most about.

"Since then, well the word 'protégé' has been kind of tabooed. That's why I get so defensive with you using that word. It's not like you aren't sort of like that to me," I made a repressed noise of disgust to myself at this admission, "I just hate that word. That's why I've always called you 'Newbie,' ya know. It's my substitute word, sort of. Instead of my protégé, you're my Newbie." I laughed, shaking my head. "You must be rubbing off on me, kid, because what I just said sounded pretty girly."

I dragged a hand across my face again, stifling a yawn, and then froze with my hand on my forehead. Had I just – no, couldn't have been. It must have been the lack of a decent night's sleep catching up with me, or my hopefulness playing tricks with my brain, but I thought... I stared for several minutes longer, but nothing happened. Like I'd thought, just a trick of my eyes. Despite myself, I felt my hopes sinking just a little. Shaking my head again, I brought my thoughts back on track.

"Anyway, what I think I'm trying to say is, I don't say it a lot, or ever I guess, but you've been a good –  _Newbie_  – and if you decide to just keep up this little 'fairy tale, enchanted sleep' act you're pulling, I'm gonna hate coming to work even more than I do. Damn it, kid, I almost  _miss_  havin' you tail me and all. So just – just wake up already, okay? I might even let you call me 'mentor.'" I sighed and then quickly added, "Once. It won't be a regular thing, mind you. Just the one time but when you say it I'll do my best to  _nawt_  deny it."

Grunting as I shifted in the hard chair, I glanced at my watch. Almost one in the morning. Definitely time for some much-needed sleep. I stood up, meaning to head for the on-call room, but I hesitated in the doorframe. I turned back, looking over my shoulder at the figure I could now only see by the faint light of the moon coming in through the window. For some reason, it was really difficult to make my foot take that extra step over the doorway. Maybe I should just…

"Okay, Tiffany, last time I'm doing this," I said, turning back around and walking back to my chair. I made myself comfortable, pulling over the second chair to prop my feet on and crossing my arms over my chest. "But if you don't wake your pansy ass up tomorrow, I'm leaving you here to sleep by yourself and laying down on an actual bed for the night." With one last glance at the figure, who was cut into sharp contrasts of light and shadow by the moonlight sneaking in through the blinds, I settled myself more comfortably and closed my eyes.


	22. My Shades of Grey

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A very existential JD chapter.
> 
> Trigger warning: references to depression and suicide.

_The world isn't made up of just black and white, and I think we've all known that since, um, whenever it was that the civil rights movements took place. I never was good at history. Anyway, this theory doesn't just pertain to people but to just about everything. No matter what you're talking about, there are always two possible extremes. The first is the beautiful, idealised belief where everything is good and there is something akin to a happily ever after in the end. The second one is pretty much the worst case scenario when Lord Voldemort takes over and inevitably the world gets disintegrated by aliens. Or, you know, something like that. But the truth of the matter is that in the end, reality is usually a blend of the both of them._

As I laid back, crossing my ankles and folding my arms behind my head, I could only think one thing: This place is so not what I expected it to be.

I'd always tried to imagine what this would be like, ever since I was eight and saw it for the first time. I'd broken my arm and when we were leaving the hospital I saw him, just laying there and looking like he was asleep except for all of the tubes and wires attached to and even coming out of him. He looked like an experiment for a mad scientist, kinda like that old Frankenstein movie I'd watched with Dad before he'd gone away. I'd asked, and Dan said he was in a coma, which he explained as a really, really deep sleep that's hard to wake up from.

For a long time, that's exactly what I thought it would be: sleep. Peaceful, full of dreams, and the person would just exist in a little fantasy world until they either woke up or just died. Yeah, I've always been an optimist.

Then I took my first psych rotation and they gave me a different theory. A few of the students in my class presented the idea that coma patients' minds were still aware of everything around them but their bodies were disconnected from their brains, which left them incapable of responding to external stimuli. Despite all of the medical facts they used to support this, I didn't like to believe this idea. Mostly because it sounded eerily like being trapped in your own body and the thought of being stuck, unable to move no matter what was going on around you, was pretty terrifying.

Turned out that the truth was something in between the two. I was sure as hell trapped in here, but I was trapped inside my head instead of my body.

If someone had asked, I would've thought the world in my head was colourful and flashy, and maybe full of dancing and unicorns like my daydreams. There might be a soundtrack in the background; The Fray, like I always seem to hear whenever something significant was going on in my life, or if I was really lucky there'd be Journey. And I would most definitely not be alone. So needless to say, I was pretty surprised to learn that the inside of my brain looked a whole lot like Sacred Heart.

When I first woke up, it didn't. It was just a long, empty hallway lined with locked doors and windows that had been painted over so I couldn't see through them. Everything was grey; the tiled floor, the doors, the indistinct mist of a ceiling, the paint coating the windows. Even the scrubs and long sleeved shirt I always wore beneath them were drab layered over dreary. Who'd have imagined the world in my head was so damn boring?

I hadn't known I was in a coma at that point. I honestly thought I was dead. When I started hearing the low hum of voices occasionally speaking from the other sides of doors, I mighta gone just a little bit crazy. As in the screaming-and-trying-to-beat-down-doors kind of crazy. The voices never paid any attention to me and disappeared at their leisure. I spent a long time running up and down the hall, which seemed to go on forever in both directions, trying doors in case one would let me out. They never did, of course. All of the voices I heard sounded familiar but I couldn't place them. The words were hardly more than murmurs so I couldn't understand them and I started to think they were taunting me. Further proof of an already well-known fact: I do  _not_  do well in solitude.

Eventually, I'd heard my name from beyond a door and finally recognised the voice as Turk. You can imagine, I freaked out. By this time I'd concluded I must be in some sort of hell because surely fire and brimstone couldn't be worse than this, so the thought of my Chocolate Bear being in hell too made me more than just a little scared. This time, his voice was louder than the others had been, although I still never caught anything more than my name, and it seemed to be moving down the hall. I'd followed it and that's when I reached the first corner.

After Turk's voice died down to a hum again, joined by another male voice I thought I might know, I finally realised what the halls reminded me of. The flat walls, doors with little windows in them (also painted grey, sadly) and the larger windows beside them, the square tiled floor. In a way, even my clothes were a hint.

Oh, and it should be noted this is the same time I remembered that before waking up here I'd been in the real Sacred Heart. I could recall the accident, my weak condition, the anaphylaxis. It didn't take a lot of thought to figure out that I was in a coma, and that this grey Sacred Heart existed only in my head.

A loud wailing that my paternal instincts told me was without a doubt Sam was what eventually led me to where I was now laying. I'd followed his crying like I'd followed Turk's voice, desperate to find him or some way to get back to him. Even when his crying stopped I kept running until I'd reached the place that all halls lead to. No, not Rome. The nurses' station.

It was grey, just like everything else. The cupboards and counters were empty; no phones, no files or tacked up notices, and no rolling office chairs. So I'd taken to laying on the countertops, re-evaluating memories that I hadn't been able to remember before coming here and waiting for more voices.

I knew they were the key to getting out of here. I could feel it when I followed them, the anticipation of something important just ahead. But then the voice would go away and somehow I would wind up back at the nurses' station even when I was sure that I was moving away from it. If I could just get someone to talk to me long enough, I knew I could make it out.

That was the other importance I'd discovered. When the voices were murmurs they weren't talking to me, so I reasoned that must be when they were talking to each other and my comatose ears were just picking up on the white noise. If I followed those voices, I only ended up walking out one side of the station and in the other. The voices were always louder when I heard them say my name; when they were talking  _to_  me. It was easier to follow those voices and I could always recognise who they were; Turk, Elliot, Carla, Kim once, even someone who I was pretty sure was Dr Kelso, as hard as it is to believe. But they always went away again and I always ended up laying back down on the counter, staring up at the misty ceiling.

I tried not to think about it but I never heard Dr Cox talking to me. I hadn't expected him to and I knew I shouldn't have gotten my hopes up. Still, after the last month, I had wanted to think that something had changed. He'd been there for me through almost this whole thing, surely he wouldn't bail on me now, right?

Elliot's voice echoed down a hall and I jumped off the counter in pursuit. Her words had a thick, garbled sound to them so I figured she was crying again. I wanted to yell at her, tell her not to cry and to just keep talking, but I'd barely gone down a hall and around a corner when she was gone again. Another six steps and I was in the station again.

I screamed in frustration and threw myself at the nearest door, but it did about as much good as it had the last hundred times. The door didn't so much as shake in its frame and I didn't feel even the slightest sting where my body had collided with the metal. When I'd woken up, the lack of pain had been a relief after the hell I'd been feeling. Now it only made me angrier. Even that awful burning in my lungs would have been better than the numbness. It made me feel like I was already dead.

Apparently, my friends had started to think so too because they didn't talk to me as much as they used to do. There were longer stretches of nothing as I waited to hear them and when they came they didn't last as long. I tried to convince myself it was just a mind trick, that I was just exaggerating time in my head because I had no way of telling in here, but I knew it wasn't true. They were giving up hope and in doing so, they were cutting off what I was sure was my only chance at escape.

Turk's voice appeared in a left-hand hall and I raced after it, pushing myself faster than I'd ever done before. Turk wouldn't give up on me. He was my best friend. He had to stick by me, we were Bears together. I flew through the labyrinth of passages as I listened to his horribly hollow voice coming from beyond the doors on either side of me. That hollowness proved it, didn't it? He needed his J-Dizzle and he had to keep trying for me so he wouldn't be so empty anymore.

Then why had his voice faded?

"NO!" I knew that screaming wouldn't help, it never had before, but I couldn't stop myself from shouting up at the cloud-like ceiling in desperation. "No, Turk, no!" Not my Super C-Bear. He couldn't give up. "Turk, please!" I'd been so sure that the one person who'd never give up on me was Turk, but now his voice was gone and I'd just stumbled back into the nurses' station.

I didn't remember the movement but suddenly I was on the floor, my knees having given out. I'd lost all motivation to stand so instead I curled into a ball on the hard floor. Turk was giving up on me, so there couldn't be any hope left. I wanted to cry, something I hadn't willingly done since my dad had deserted the family. Dan had called me a baby and Mom had told me that I needed to be a strong boy before she left for the bar to drown her sorrows in alcohol and the first eager man she found. I had only cried four times in my life since that day, and each time I remembered fighting the tears until they had stopped and retreated. But now, when I wanted nothing more than to just let them fall and indulge myself in my utter hopelessness, they wouldn't come.

I wasn't going to be able to endure this much longer. If there was no possibility of getting out of here, I wasn't about to hang out in this private hell until my body finally gave out on me. Even death would be a reprieve from this.

Heaving myself to my feet, I began looking around. There had to be something. Some way. I glanced furtively at the nearest window. Broken glass would work. Summoning every ounce of strength I could, I barrelled head first into the large sheet of glass. Nothing. I bounced off without so much as a flash of pain and the window didn't even tremble under the force. The dull thud of my skull against the window resounded off down the halls mockingly.

"NO!" I hurled myself again and again at the glass with the same effect before turning and bringing my forehead down against the corner of the counter. Still nothing. My hands closed around my throat and I waited for the lethargy and the darkness to tease the edges of my vision. Except it never came and I realised, a little belatedly, that as a figment of my own imagination it wasn't likely that I needed to breathe in the first place. "Damn it! Damn it, damn it, _damn it_!"

" _Newbie!"_

I could only stare ahead numbly, too surprised as the yell reverberated around me. Maybe the suffocation was working and I was hallucinating. I couldn't have just heard that voice. Everyone else had gone away and he just showed up now. Impossible. Still, I couldn't stop my hopes from flying.

" _Newbie!"_

"Dr Cox," I gasped out, dropping my hands. It really was him. He was talking to me, and I didn't even care that he sounded angry. This was my chance and I was taking it. I tore down the hall, chasing that familiar, berating voice.

A constant stream of nicknames sounded through the doors ahead of me. Mostly Newbie, but the occasional girls' name too, as well as the time I distinctly heard labradoodle. I didn't even bother trying to figure that out; I had more important concerns. Still, I was thanking the fact that he sounded so frustrated because it meant that he was really going at it. An angry Dr Cox rant  _had_  to give me enough time.

I wasn't taking any chances, this time, so any time his voice would falter or grow fainter, I would stop moving until it picked up again. The sense of urgency in my chest was stronger than ever. And then I rounded a corner and saw it: the door to a patient room was ajar.

There was a plaque outside the door that read "ICU 204." This was it. Racing forward before Dr Cox's voice could go away, I threw open the door.

Whatever I'd been expecting, it was not this. I thought maybe there would be a flash of light and I'd wake up, or maybe I'd see myself laying in a hospital bed and I would touch my body and be drawn back into it. Instead, I was standing at the edge of what I thought was a sheet of glass that reached all the way to the horizon in every direction, reflecting the murky mist sky that was still overhead. A closer inspection showed that it wasn't glass but water, although the water was so frighteningly still it didn't look real. It was also grey, though whether on its own or because it was reflecting the sky I didn't know. I stared at the flat expanse and then down into the darkness that crowded beneath the surface, making it impossible to see the bottom. Was this really my way out?

" _Protégé…"_

I was almost too shocked by the word to notice, but as Dr Cox's voice had risen I thought I'd seen a faint glimmer beneath the surface of the pool. Was I supposed to go in there? The word "protégé" rang around me and I saw it again. I frowned uneasily at the water but what other choice did I really have? Gritting my teeth, I jumped.

I immediately sank like a rock. No matter how hard I kicked, I just kept going down. The lighter greys above me were being washed out by the charcoal shadows of the deep water. I could no longer see my hands as they clawed frantically through the water that was pulling me down like quicksand.

Panic set in fast. What had I done? I couldn't see the flicker of light that I'd jumped in after, although I could still hear Dr Cox talking. What if the light had actually been reflected off the surface from above? I never looked up. Maybe I was supposed to go up. Now that I thought about it, sinking down into the dark just sounded too much like dying. Wasn't that how it was usually described?

Pain suddenly began coursing through me, so strong I almost stopped kicking. Everywhere hurt. All of my limbs, my head, my chest. The waves of pain were debilitating. I gasped and my lungs seared.

" …  _always called you 'Newbie,' … my substitute word … instead of my protégé, you're my Newbie … "_

Actually, it was sort of nice to just sit and listen to Dr Cox, so nice that I quit struggling so I could hear him better. If I was going to die listening to this then maybe it wasn't so bad. At least I knew he cared. I'd always known, but it was nice to finally hear it.

" …  _you've been a good – Newbie … "_

I smiled vaguely. It had never occurred to me what that name could possibly mean. I had always thought it was demeaning. I knew I was the only person he used it for, I had jealously guarded that honour if only to have something significantly ours, but now it meant so much more. Every time he'd said it, he was acknowledging me as his protégé. That made a warm feeling blossom in my chest.

The warmth quickly turned into a terrible heat. I couldn't recall inhaling but the air that filled my lungs ripped through me like fire. My heart was pounding against the flames. Sudden fear gripped me. I didn't want to die yet. I had to get back to thank Dr Cox, to watch my son grow up, to play silly games with Turk, to tell Elliot that I loved her. This couldn't be the end.

Drowsiness was eating away at my thoughts and I couldn't focus. My body wouldn't respond as I tried to kick out again. I felt like lead as I continued to sink into the cool, black abyss and the pressure was crushing me. I couldn't fight any longer. I was too weak.

The last thing I knew was a sudden stillness in my ribcage as my heart gave out.


	23. His Final Line

_Everything comes to an end, and there isn't a whole lot more to it than that. You can get as cliché as you want and say that "the greatest things in life end eventually" or that "every end is just another beginning" but honestly, who cares about all that bullshit? The God honest truth is simply that, be it a terrible television show, the greatest sex you've ever had, or even life itself, it all ends._

One of the most important skills a doctor needs to have is the ability to sleep. I'm not talking about just lay down and drift off; I mean to sleep anywhere and immediately jump up and be fully functional at a moment's notice, even if you'd only gotten five minutes of rest. It's the hard truth that seems to pick off at least half of the interns who scrape through eight years of school only to realise that they can't deal with the hours. Doctors have to learn to be able to lay down and instantly fall asleep, whether on a bed in the on-call room with a couple getting cosy on the bed above you or in a chair in the lounge while idiot surgeons are wrestling for the remote. You gotta learn to tune out all of the noise and draw on every second of sleep that you can get so you don't kill anyone. And I'm proud to say that this is a skill I've mastered quite beautifully, to the point where I can even get in a few minutes of sleep leaning on the counter of the nurses' station while Jordan shouts in my ear about something I did or didn't do.

No matter how many things you learn to sleep through, though, there are just some things that wake doctors up faster than a bucket of cold water to the face. First is that innate trigger that goes off in the brain when you subconsciously realise that your shift ends in ten minutes. Second, that god-damned pager telling you that even if your shift is ending in four seconds, you've still got to be doing your job. And a doctor's last natural alarm clock?

I jerked awake and had flown to my feet before the realisation of what I was hearing had even gotten through my sleep-fogged brain. My back was groaning in protest and I still hadn't shaken off the uneasy feeling that my dreams had left in me, but all of that seemed to wash to the back of my mind as the truth and the adrenaline set in. That single, monotonous note reverberated in the room as my eyes found the flat, green line.

Panic aiding my speed, I ran over and threw open the door. "Nurse!" I shouted into the hall and saw a pair of pink scrubs hurling itself around the counter and toward me. I tugged on a pair of gloves and raced back to the bedside. The flatline was still screaming in my ears as I began chest compressions, praying that they would restart his heart without breaking his ribs through again. A second later, the nurse had arrived and I glanced back long enough to see that she was pushing a crash cart.

"No, his heart's too weak," I said, shouting without realising I was doing it. "Get me an epi, _now_! That's our only shot." Thankfully she didn't fight with me, and instead she nodded and jogged out to grab the epinephrine. I turned my eyes back to the face that was half obscured behind the breathing tube. "C'mon Newbie, don't do this to me now."

The nurse had come back and she readied the syringe in the IV, looking up at me expectantly. I gave a curt nod and watched as she depressed the plunger. As much as I wanted to look up, glare at that stupid, screaming line until it started moving, I couldn't do it. At the same time, I couldn't keep staring at that face, so still and inexpressive that it surely had to be a different person. Feeling like a girl for doing it, I closed my eyes and was startled to feel that they were burning. I kept up the chest compressions as I stood and listened hopefully for the slightest change in sound coming from the heart monitor.

Three minutes. That was how much time a person had after their heart stopped before the lack of blood in the brain started to take effect. If the person was really lucky, they could last up until four minutes. After that, the decline in brain function was exponential and by the time the next sixty seconds had passed, there was no point in hell in restarting their heart because they'd have less potential for thought than a rock.  _Don't think like that._ Still, I couldn't stop myself from glancing at my watch between compressions.

_One minute, thirty-seven seconds._

It wasn't supposed to end like this. In my soaps, it always seemed like when the cold-hearted bastard finally came through and showed his true colours then the patient would get better. While I knew that life wasn't exactly like Days of Our Lives, I'd secretly been hoping that there would at least be some similarity. I mean, I'd just told Newbie practically everything he'd wanted to hear from me for the last seven years. Somehow after that, I'd imagined that he'd wake up simply so he could hold it over my head for the rest of my natural born life. That was just something he'd do. So why wasn't he coming back?

"C'mon Newbie!" _Two minutes, four seconds._

There was a basic theory in hospitals that sometimes the patient would hang on just long enough for everyone to say their goodbyes. I'd seen it time and time again. The patient would be hanging on by a thread until that last, reluctant family member overcame their denial and finally said their bit, and then within hours they would die.

Was that what was happening here? Gandhi, Carla, Barbie, Kim, even Bobbo had come and paid their respects in one form or another. Had Newbie just been waiting for me to man up and say my piece?

_Two minutes, twenty-six seconds._

It couldn't actually be like this, could it? I mean, a Sacred Heart with Newbie as a patient was weird, but what would this place be like without any Newbie at all? It seemed so strange that he had become such a crucial part of my image of this place. I had gotten along just fine before him. Before he'd come here, there was no giant missing piece that he had magically filled on his arrival. Life had been fine before he'd gotten here, so why was it so hard to believe that life wouldn't be the same without him?

_Two minutes, forty-two seconds._

Because it wouldn't be the same, and I knew that. He may not have been wanted, but he'd sure as hell butted his way into my life and made himself comfortable. Without consciously letting him in, Newbie had somehow managed to ingratiate himself into every aspect of my life, from the fact that he plagued my every second at work to the fact that he and my daughter shared initials. I couldn't escape him even if I wanted to. He was irrevocably a piece of the metaphorical jigsaw puzzle of my world.

_Two minutes, fifty-three seconds._

So what, now he was just gonna check out? Go through the lengthy and arduous task of weaving himself into every single nook and cranny of my life and then leave? What made Newbie think that he could come in, flip my whole damn world upside down, and then just leg it out of here? No way was he going to get away with that.

_Three minutes, five seconds._

"Goddammit, JD!" The nurse flinched but I didn't care. The three minutes were up; if he didn't come back soon it was a lost cause. As if the kid's chances of surviving this weren't bad enough already, now there was the threat of brain damage that could make coming out of this more of a curse than a blessing.

My eyes flicked to the crash cart but I knew there was no chance of it. Not only was his heart too weak to take the strain of suddenly having electricity pumped into it but we'd have to unhook his ventilator so we didn't electrocute him. By the time we got around to it, it would already be too late. Add to that the fact that the pressure would most likely break his ribs again and probably collapse another lung, using the defibrillators was practically signing his death certificate. Which it seemed like I was going to have to do anyway.

"Doctor!" I came back from my internal ranting to see that the nurse was pointing over my shoulder. A quick glance showed that the green line was moving in a steady, if slow, rate. I stepped back to see if his heart would keep it up without my help and was relieved to see that the pace stayed. Snapping off my gloves, I checked my watch.

_Three minutes, thirty-one seconds._

"Thanks," I said with a stiff nod at the nurse. She took it wordlessly and scampered out of the room. As soon as she was gone, I turned around with a growl and shoved the crash cart against the wall. It tipped on its side, spilling supplies across the floor. My rage switched to the chairs and I upturned them both. "Damn it!" I slammed my fists against the wall, feeling the satisfactory sting through my wrists, and then threaded my hands through my hair.

I wasn't sure how much longer I was going to be able to do this. I'd hung around through all of this but there was no way I was going to just sit around and wait for Newbie to crash again. How many more times would it be before we couldn't bring him back? How many more times would it be until I couldn't save him? Was it safer to just accept that he was gone and stop wasting hope?

"Christ, Newbie, you're going to be the death of me." Crossing the room, I righted a chair and sat down, propping my head in my hands. It was only three in the morning, meaning I'd hardly gotten two hours sleep, and I was even more exhausted as I felt the adrenaline dissipating. At this point, it wasn't too far of a stretch to believe that this really was going to kill me if we kept going like this. Even as I was just sitting there, I felt my eyes closing and the softness of sleep teasing at the edges of my mind.

There was a strange gasping noise coming from Newbie's bed and as I looked up he had one hand extended toward the ceiling, fingers curved into claws. The moonlight streaming through the window was glowing off his opened eyes and I could see that he was terrified. His hand was now reaching for me, his eyes pleading, and he was still making that choked noise around his breathing tube. I tried to get up to help him but exhaustion had made my body so heavy I couldn't move. There was a faint trace of blood rolling from his mouth and he emitted the loudest gasp so far...

With a strangled noise of surprise, I woke up again and straightened in my chair, blinking in the harsh fluorescent. I rubbed my hands against my face, trying to scrub away the disturbing image that my dream had left embedding in my head. Damn it all, like I wasn't sleep-deprived enough already without having all these bizarre nightmares. That creepy, gasping noise was still echoing in my ears and sent chills up my spine. Even as the images slowly faded, that noise wouldn't go away.

Bolting upright, I looked over at the bed. Eyes were still lidded, no flailing arms, no blood dripping from the mouth. But that noise was still there, and now that I was more awake I could tell that it wasn't coming from inside my head. I rubbed sleep from my eyes to see better and saw a hand fisted around the bedsheet. And still, there was that gasping sound. Impossible…

"JD?" I asked, jumping out of the chair so quickly that I stumbled against the bed. Standing at the bedside, I could see that his other hand had drifted up to his neck and his fingers were scrabbling over it frantically as the gasping noises came faster. "JD?" His eyes didn't open and his hand moved towards his mouth. I quickly grabbed his wrist to keep him from hurting himself and I could hear the heart monitor picking up in rate as he fought my grip.

"JD, listen to me," I said, trying to get his attention. If I couldn't get him to focus so we could get that tube out of him, he was going to damage his throat. "Quit fighting me and pay attention." Still no change. "Damn it, Newbie!"

JD's eyes snapped open so quickly that I instinctively took a half-step back from the bed and they were focused on me with the sort of intensity that people usually associated with my 'crazy eyes.' Shaking myself, I said, "Newbie, ya gotta stop fighting me and listen or you're going to hurt yourself. You've been intubated, you gotta stop breathing."

Newbie didn't respond but the gasping noises stopped so I assumed he was paying attention. I let go of his wrist and he carefully set his hand down at his side again, never taking his gaze off me. "Alright, you know how this works, kid," I said. "You cough, I pull. Ready?" There was the slightest nod but I'd already seen the answer in that freakishly focused stare. I nodded, the kid's eyes screwed up as he coughed, and I slid the tube out.

Leaning over to turn off the ventilator, I heard Newbie take a deep, overcompensating breath. When I straightened up, he was staring at me again and massaging his throat with a hand.

"You alright there, Miranda?"

"Yeah," he said, grimacing and rubbing his throat again. "What – what happened?"

"Dumbass intern gave you a medication you're allergic to and you had a pretty rough anaphylactic reaction. Went comatose," I explained quickly. Newbie nodded as if he already knew this. "I just brought you out of cardiac arrest about," I glanced at my watch and was startled by the time, "thirty minutes ago."

At this, his hand moved down to touch his chest and there was an incredulous look on his face. "So my heart _did_ stop," he murmured. Before I could answer, his eyes had flicked back up to me and he asked weakly, "How long was I gone?"

"This would have been day six," I answered. I surveyed his face and finally processed the reality that he was awake. "Welcome back, kid."

Newbie grinned. "Thanks." His expression was thoughtful and he looked around as if seeing everything for the first time. "Hey, Dr Cox?" I grunted for him to continue. "You remember way back my first year when you made fun of me for thinking coma patients could hear everything we said?" I grunted again. "Well, I was sorta right," he answered proudly.

"Is that so?" I asked, feigning casualness when I was, in fact, thinking wildly. Did that mean Newbie had heard everything I had said to him tonight? I had meant for that but I also hadn't expected it to really work, and now that it had, I was a little panicked. No, not panicked, just a little… alarmed? In a manly way, of course.

"Well, sort of," Newbie confessed. "I could always tell when someone was talking to me but I never really understood what they were saying beyond what their tone said." He paused and smiled. "I feel really bad about Tasty Coma Wife now," he added with a hesitant laugh.

I had just opened my mouth to laugh when something occurred to me. When I looked down at Newbie, he seemed to have realised the same thing I had. "Oh, yeah, I got my memory back, by the way," he said hastily and grinned.

"You're pretty calm about it for someone who just spent the last month with amnesia, Charlene," I remarked, a little surprised by this. It wasn't normal for him to not freak out every time he had something that could be considered a victory.

Newbie seemed to sense what I was thinking because he laughed, although it brought on a bout of coughing that made his eyes water. "I had 'em back the whole time I was in the coma," he said once he'd fixed his breathing. He shifted on the mattress and then sat up, stretching with a frown. "I've had a little time to adjust."

"Well damn, it looks like I'm not getting rid of you then, am I?"

And there it was; the widest, most Newbie-ish grin I'd seen on his face since before the accident. "Sorry, Per, but I'm back for good."

"Call me Per again, Amanda, and you'll be back in a coma." Newbie just shrugged and kept on smiling. "Can't make things easy on us, can you? All it took to get you back was a potential medical malpractice suit, an emergency surgery, a coma, and your – what would this be, _fourth_? – bout of cardiac arrest. Drama queen much?" Apparently nothing was going to take that God damn grin off his face, but for once I didn't care. It meant he was back and he was in the clear. This whole hellish nightmare was over.

"Oh, but Newbie," I added, my tone more serious so that he looked up at me with the slightest bit of trepidation, "you drive without a seatbelt again, I'm gonna have to go ahead and kill you myself."

And before I could stop myself, before that look of confusion could clear from his face, I swept down and pulled him into a quick, three-second hug.


	24. Epilogue: My One Year Later

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fun Fact: In the entirety of this story, Dr Cox uses exactly sixty-four girls' names for JD with no repeats!

_Every good story has to have that final conclusion, the one where it zooms into the future and tells you that everything turned out all right. Of course, the reality is that things don't always turn out completely right. For me, well, actually yeah, it did turn out fairly well. The greatest thing about wants is that sometimes you find out the thing you wanted was there all along, just hidden. And me, well now I think I'm finding out I've had everything I wanted from the start and all it took was one helluva year to get there._

I shivered and wrapped my coat tighter around myself. A mid-November wind had suddenly whipped up and it was really starting to feel like winter. I stuffed my hands deep into my coat pockets and shifted to keep my feet warm. So far I hadn't really felt compelled to say much so I just stood in the grass and looked around in the rapidly declining temperature. It was nearing sunset and with each centimetre the sun sank, the temperature seemed to drop another five degrees. I knew I wasn't going to be able to stay much longer but I didn't want to leave just yet.

Still not coming up with anything to say, my eyes turned downward once more. There was a rectangular copper plate at my feet, half buried in grass that was in good need of a trim. I could barely make out the embossed words in the fading light.

_Lily Catherine Marks_

_August 19, 1996 - November 11, 2008_

_Our Blessed Little Angel_

The right half of the grave marker was decorated with a carved angel with a sweet face. There were a lot of bouquets of flowers lying all around the marker, including the small collection of brightly coloured flowers I had brought with me when I'd arrived a half hour ago. They weren't exactly the prettiest flowers or the flowers I felt she deserved, but they were the best I could pick up from the gift shop on my way out from a triple shift since I'd come over here as soon as I'd gotten off. It had been one year ago, exactly one year today, when Dr Cox had woken me up to tell me that she was gone.

A lot of things had changed in those twelve months. I had gotten out of the hospital about two months after that, finally capable of moving on my own. Of course, most of that moving had been in a wheelchair until my ribs had finally healed enough for me to use crutches. Because of that, I had spent a lot of time just hanging out in the hospital, usually in the lounge or the nurses' stations since Carla and C-Bear didn't trust me to be home alone. Neither did Dr Cox, he was just too stubborn to admit it, but I knew he liked having me around.

I got quite an earful when Dan showed up four days after I'd woken up, telling me that he'd gotten home from his conference to a voicemail informing him I was in a coma. Despite it all, I felt good anyway because he'd hopped the first plane to California and he gave me a huge bear hug, telling me not to scare him like that again or he'd kill me. Which reminded me a lot of what Dr Cox had said before he'd given me my hug.

Yeah, I finally got that hug from my mentor. Trust me, it surprised me too, and all it took was nearly dying a couple times. Out of the blue, he was telling me something about wearing a seatbelt, which I only finally understood several hours later, and then he pulled me into a hug. Granted, it wasn't very long, but it was everything I dreamed it would be. His arms were all warm and strong around me, and he smelled so – _paternal_. I know, I know, I sound gay, but I swear, that hug was perfection. Not even a Super Chocolate Bear hug ending in an _Eeeeagle!_ could top that.

Since then, things had gone pretty much back to normal. I did my job and took a private entertainment out of annoying Dr Cox, he berated me and called me girls' names and basically demeaned me in any way he could think of at the given moment. But for some reason, now I could hear in his voice that there wasn't (usually) a whole lot of conviction behind the insults. It hurt a lot less that way. I don't know whether there was less anger under his words or if I was just more in tune to the real intentions of what he said, but either way, I knew that he cared and it made it all a lot easier to handle.

"Hey there, Newbie." Speak of the devil… Dr Cox stepped up next to me and I could see out of the corner of my eye that he was clutching a bouquet of flowers, dominated by three large sunflowers, loosely in one hand. "Hope I'm not interrupting your girl time."

"Nah, just thinking," I answered, shrugging. He made a small grunting noise and then bent to put the flowers down on the headstone. "Hard to believe it's been a year, huh?"

"Yeah," Dr Cox answered, stuffing his hands down into his coat pockets as well. "How long you been out here? It's flu season, I can't afford for you to get sick too. Who'd I dump all the patients off on?"

I smiled. "Don't worry, I haven't been here long. Only got off a half hour ago. Just wanted to come by and see her." Dr Cox nodded, making one of those quiet grunts in the back of his throat. "What about you, I thought you got off two hours ago?"

"Board meeting," Dr Cox said with a noise of annoyance. "Just got out of two hours of listening to the board members trying to suggest ways to cut costs while I informed them that each of those ways would also cut lives. Not that they cared, of course. Heartless bastards." I smiled. Nobody cared about patients quite as much as Dr Cox, except maybe me. "So, uh, how's Sammy liking the new place?"

"He loves it," I said, grinning at the thought. Just two weeks ago, I had moved into a small house midway between the hospital and Kim's place. It meant about a half-hour drive to get to either, but it meant that I got to see Sam more often so it was worth it. Not to mention that he now had his own room, which Elliot and I were planning to decorate over the weekend. "You were right, he asked me for a puppy the other day."

Dr Cox laughed. "Told you it would happen soon, 'specially now that you got a bit of a yard. Whatcha gonna get him, a Chihuahua? Maybe one of those hairballs with feet that make high squeaky noises? Hey, maybe that's what language your girlfriend speaks!"

I tried very hard not to laugh at that but I was pretty certain that my frown did not look all that convincing. "Nah, actually I was thinking about something like Rowdy," I confessed.

"Only, ya know, alive?" Dr Cox asked with a raised eyebrow.

"Well, yeah," I said and then added in a grumble, "Rowdy _is_ alive." Dr Cox looked at me sceptically so I cleared my throat and returned to a normal level. "Something like a retriever or a Labrador. Or maybe a labradoodle," I finished with a grin and watched Dr Cox fight to not look embarrassed. I never did find out what exactly that labradoodle comment had been about but for some reason, he looked really awkward every time I made jokes about it. Maybe he'd called me a labradoodle again and felt guilty for calling a coma guy a dog, or maybe he'd compared me to labradoodles because they're cute and loyal and man's best friend.

I drifted off for a moment, imagining myself as a labradoodle. Boy, was I adorable, and Dr Cox would play fetch with me and rub my belly and tell me what a good boy I was. "Hmm, I'd make a good puppy," I mused aloud.

"If you say so, Denise," Dr Cox said, rolling his eyes. I shook my head quickly, bringing myself back to reality. I was having a genuine conversation with Dr Cox, not a good time to be daydreaming. I could go back to the puppy theory later. "Jacky'll be real jealous if Sam gets a puppy. I'll never hear the end of it."

"You know, Jack and little JD are welcome to come over," I offered yet again. They had been around a couple of times, usually when I was employed to babysit so he and Jordan could have some alone time. It worked out fairly well because Sam and Jennifer were about the same age so they played well, leaving me to keep Jack from causing too much trouble. Which he was definitely good at. He was most positively a Sullivan-Cox.

"Oh, be sure of it, Newbie," Dr Cox said. "Whenever Jack starts throwing tantrums because he doesn't have a puppy, I will most ce- _hertainly_  be shipping him and  _Jennifer Dylan_  over." I grinned a little at the way he emphasised Jennifer's real name. I still loved the fact that we had the same nickname. He always insisted it was Jordan's idea and I knew better than to risk telling him that it had been my suggestion. We'd just barely gotten to the point where he'd be nice to me on occasion, I wasn't gonna rock the boat.

"And you and Jordan are welcome to come over sometime for dinner too, if you want," I said as casually as I could. I found out he responded a little less bitingly to my invitations if I didn't act overly happy or hopeful.

Dr Cox made that noise of disgust where he pulled his upper lip back on one side, the one that was usually followed by him simply turning and walking away from me with his hands behind his head. "Don't count on it, Starshine," he said plainly. I struggled very hard to not look disappointed. There was a moment of awkward silence while I stared at the ground and Dr Cox stood by me, but what he was doing I didn't know because I was making a point not to look at him. I shifted my weight to the other leg, easing up on my left leg which had started to ache from being on my feet for so long. It had healed, just not to exactly one-hundred-percent. Four breaks in one leg never had much of a chance of perfect repair.

"But speaking of dinner," he said and I looked up so fast I felt my neck seize up.  _Ouchie_! Dr Cox had rubbed his hands over his face and plunged them back into his pockets again before continuing. "Jordan's insisting that this year for Thanksgiving, instead of her taking the kids up to her mom's we're doing a big family dinner. And as if that's not torture enough, she also says that if you and Sam and Barbie want to come, ya can. I don't like the idea in the slightest but if I want to have sex ever again in this lifetime I gotta go with what she says, so…"

 _Oh my god…_  I tried very, very hard to not suddenly jump up in the air dancing but it took a lot of effort. Dr Cox was inviting me over to his place for Thanksgiving like I was part of the family. "Yeah, sure, sounds good," I said as coolly as I could but even I could hear the trembling of unexpressed ecstasy in my voice.

Dr Cox was watching me thoughtfully and then said, "Alright Newb, you get four seconds to let out that little happy dance you're holding in before you spontaneously combust. Starting," he looked at his watch, "now." I let out a loud whoop, jumping into the air and breaking out into an immediate dance. I was just starting in on Dr Robot when Dr Cox said, "Okay, time's up. Stop now or I take back the offer."

I instantly stilled myself but I couldn't help the fact that I was grinning from ear to ear. Dr Cox rolled his eyes but I could tell he was trying not to smile. "Thanks," I said, unable to help myself.

"I swear it, Roberta, you don't keep cool about it and I'll kick you right back out," he said seriously and I swallowed the smile long enough to nod. "Good. Now whaddya say we go? It's gettin' pretty cold out here." I looked around and saw that the sun had set, and when I exhaled my breath formed little misty puffs in front of my face. I entertained myself with blowing puffy clouds for a second before remembering that Dr Cox had asked me a question.

"Oh, yeah, probably a good idea," I agreed and pulled my coat tighter around myself.

Dr Cox nodded. "See ya 'round, Lils," he said to the gravestone and then turned to walk away.

"Thanks for everything," I said, staring down at the embossed angel. "I miss you, Lil, hope you're having fun up there in heaven." I knelt, kissed my palm and placed it against the angel. When I stood up, I found Dr Cox watching me but surprisingly he said nothing. We fell into step together as we headed for the distant shadows of our cars, parked near each other on the edge of the street.

"Still limping?" Dr Cox asked, peering sideways at me.

"Only when I've been standing too long," I admitted, trying to disguise the faintly loping gait. "I haven't gotten off my feet much since ten o'clock yesterday morning. Besides, I think the limp makes me look tough. Tortured. Complicated."

"Keep dreaming, Lou-Anne. Complicated, you may be," Dr Cox said, grinning, "but you are definitely not tough. I think it makes you look like a kid with a bum leg. And the only one here who's tortured is me simply because I'm here trying to hold a conversation with you." I pouted but he ignored me until we reached the cars. "You up for a beer, kid?" Dr Cox asked and then amended before I could answer, "Beers, Noel, not those girly little drinks you do when you're with your friends."

"Yeah, a beer sounds good," I said and we climbed into our cars, me once again trying to quell the rush of excitement. I let it out by singing along loudly to Journey as I followed his car to the nearest bar, and once we were there we sat down and ordered our beers.

"Crazy year, huh?" Dr Cox said, eyeing the top of his beer bottle before popping the cap off. I followed suit and lifted my bottle thoughtfully.

"To this crazy ass rollercoaster of life," I said, holding the bottle for a toast.

Dr Cox raised an eyebrow. "Newbie, what did I tell you about talking about life being a rollercoaster?" he said like someone who was on their last thread of patience. Which I knew he wasn't, he was just play-acting. He secretly adored me and my funky fresh personality that was so the yin to his yang. Of course, then he brushed his thumb to his nose and glared, and I had to think that maybe he was just the tiniest bit annoyed.

"To not to," I said glumly, biting my lower lip.

Dr Cox watched me for another long minute and then raised his bottle. "Just this once," he said resignedly. "Because it's Lily's day and she would've like it." He grimaced and said, "To the crazy ass rollercoaster." I grinned as I tapped my bottle to his, making a satisfying _clink_ , and we both took long swallows.

_So, life is definitely a crazy ass rollercoaster, full of a whole lot of ups and downs and turns you aren't expecting, but we all get on board for the same reason; we're looking for an exciting ride and it wouldn't be as fun without all the elements. My life has certainly always been full of wild loops, but you know, in the end, I wouldn't change a thing._


End file.
